One of our District's Special Education Teachers has created a site to help families explore their options for assistive technology. Check it out!
0 Comments
What We’re Learning
Last month we learned many new things! Our units included “Food” and “Fall”. We learned new vocabulary of fruits and vegetables, explored real pumpkins and learned about seasonal changes through stories and activities. We worked on sorting objects and telling when things are the same and different. This month our language units include: “Brown Bear, Brown Bear” and “Colors”. With these units, we will be focusing on many skills including naming colors, matching and identifying patterns and rhythms Notes and Reminders Flu season With changing weather comes cold/flu season. Please watch your child for signs of illness. If your child has a fever, excessively runny nose or bad cough, he/she should probably stay home from school. We do our best to prevent the spread of germs at preschool and to teach your children healthful practices. You can promote healthy practices at home, such as using a tissue, covering coughs and sneezes, and washing hands often. Upcoming Events o Thanksgiving break, no developmental preschool November 27th and 28th o Winter break, no developmental preschool December 22nd-January 2nd Monthly Teacher Tip Every now and then our little ones may act out. Here are some tips on how to help manage and regulate their behaviors. o Provide child with schedules and routines. Prepare child for changes in daily schedule by providing advance warning, talking with, and listening to child. o Provide choices for as much as possible. This can be a great behavior-management tool. o Acknowledge child for expressing and regulating feelings and give verbal reinforcement when the child manages both positive and negative feelings appropriately. Ex: “Wow, I can tell that you were very mad, but I like how you used your words to tell them how you felt. That was the right thing to do.” o Communicate expectations clearly by modeling and showing the child how to respond. o Encourage eye-contact during interactions. This can be done with gestures to your eyes, or say, “Eyes” when you want their attention or they want yours. This is an excellent essay written by Jim Sinclair, an autistic writer and autism rights activist. What We’re Learning We just finished up our getting to know you and on the farm units. We learned the names of different farm animals and practiced signing the names for the animals. We have also been practicing recognizing our written names and remembering the first letter of our names. We are now entering our We Love Food unit where we will be introducing new food vocab words and food categories! Notes and Reminders
Autumn is here! The weather is changing and so are the leaves. It’s starting to get cold! We will try to play outside as much as the weather will allow, so please remember to send your child to school with a warm coat and appropriate footwear. We love to play outside! Purple Folders Purple folders will come home every Wednesday and Thursday with information, newsletters and school papers. Please take a moment to read through the information, leave comments on the provided sheet if needed, and send the folders back the following school day. Cold Season With our changing weather, there is always the ever-increasing risk of getting sick-- especially with little ones. Many families are getting flu shots for their children, and if that is something you are interested in, now’s the time to do it! We appreciate phone calls regarding your child’s illness and absence from preschool. Illness Policy: Child must be fever free for > 24 hours before returning to preschool. Child must stay home for 24 hours if they have >2 bouts of diarrhea in one preschool day. Upcoming Events Halloween is just around the corner! If your family celebrates this holiday, you are welcome to send your child to school in their Halloween costume. Please be mindful that it is appropriate for walking, playing, possibly getting dirty and isn’t too scary. We’re excited to see what little critters might show up! Please note that on October 31st there will be no school for students due to K-12 parent/teacher conferences. We hope your family enjoys a fun and safe weekend! Further down the road, our last day before Thanksgiving break will be Wednesday November 26th. School will resume again on Tuesday December 2nd. Also: Picture day will be on Friday, October 24th. Be sure to dress and groom your little ones accordingly! 7 Ways to End Picky Eating
Strategies for raising an adventurous eater (that will eat at least some of his veggies) (Copied from http://www.parenting.com/article/7-ways-to-end-picky-eating) By Celia Barbour I wanted my kids to be good eaters. It mattered quite a lot to me, in fact. But I wondered, during the breast-pump-and-jarred-baby-food days, what I could do to help them grow up liking not only broccoli and oranges but also foods like salmon, fava beans and goat cheese, as I do. Or was appetite one of those things, like personality and hair color, that's simply ingrained? I wish I could say that I was motivated purely by concern for their health, but that was only part of it. I also wanted them to grow up open-minded about new experiences, starting with ones that arrive on a plate. Mostly, I was motivated by self-interest. I love to cook, and longed for eager guinea pigs at the table. I had spent too many years living alone and attempting to divide recipes in fourths, or eating leftovers night after night. What joy to march boldly into a recipe that "serves six"! Joy, that is, as long as my diners wouldn't stick out their tongues and yell "yuck!" So I did some research, watched friends with their kids and talked it over with my husband. He and I have evolved a set of seven strategies for raising an adventurous eater, or at least turning a cautious eater into a more adventurous one. Well, they've worked for us. At least for now. 1. You're not a short-order cook.At mealtime, we tell our three kids, "This is what's for dinner. If you don't like it, that's fine; you don't have to eat it. But there isn't anything else." They can decide for themselves whether to eat the food in front of them or wait until the next opportunity. Of course, it helps to consider their tastes when planning a meal, making sure that—in addition to the new recipe you're trying—at least one or two of the other offerings are tried-and-true favorites. It was the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) that actually gave me the courage to follow through with this idea. Around the time my firstborn, George, was learning to say "No!" I came across this passage in its book Guide to Your Child's Nutrition: "Children will not become ill or suffer permanently if they refuse a meal or two, but parents sometimes act as though youngsters might shrivel up and die." If you've been giving your child alternative entrees up until now and she threatens to go on a hunger strike rather than eat the family meal (as some certainly will), I suggest you try strategies 5 and 6. 2. You can spice things up.True, kids have delicate taste buds, but that doesn't mean they need to be served a steady diet of pasta with butter (even if that's all they ask for). In fact, it's all the more reason to give them flavorful food; children really notice when something tastes good because of their naturally sensitive palates. I expected my kids to shun garlic when they were babies, for instance. And surely, I thought, they'd hate olives. But a little garlic makes so many things taste better that even a 1-year-old can enjoy the difference (there's a good chance he's already sampled it in your breast milk anyway). Olives can be wonderful, too, if they're the mild, fragrant kind marinated in oil and herbs. I do go out of my way to avoid very spicy foods and funky, stinky things like blue cheese. But other than that, I cook the same kinds of meals for my family that I used to cook for friends. 3. Give vegetables the hard sell.This food group is traditionally a mom's biggest hurdle, and it's easy to understand why. Boiled and salted, vegetables are typically nothing more than a good-for-you side dish, dumped by the ladleful alongside things that actually taste yummy. No wonder getting kids to eat them requires begging and threats, tactics that quickly backfire. Because once your kids realize that you really, really want them to eat vegetables, refusing to do so becomes a power struggle that they will always win. I've had success using recipes that integrate vegetables into delicious main dishes, such as eggplant layered with spiced ground lamb, smashed peas and rice and sautéed zucchini with tomato and basil. And I've made lots of vegetable-based sauces for pasta. Another trick: On the nights that I do serve vegetables as a side dish, I'll often place them on the table first, when my kids are the hungriest. Usually they've wolfed them down by the time the rest of the meal arrives. 4. Try to eat dinner together. You've heard all the research: Kids who eat dinner with their parents have healthier diets, better vocabularies, get better grades, blahblahblah. I'm not going to guilt-trip you about needing to do it every night. But do try to pull it off when you can. And be realistic with your expectations. Little guys simply can't sit at a dinner table for very long. A toddler may last only five minutes, and 15 minutes from a 4-year-old is a very good thing. So that our children appreciate family dinnertime without feeling coerced into it, here's what we decided: If one of our two bigger (out of the high chair, that is) kids is finished eating his dinner, he can leave the table, but he can't hang around nearby, playing and talking and distracting the rest of us. He has to go into the living room or upstairs to his room and entertain himself. Usually, it turns out that what he really wants is our company and attention, so he'll stay in his seat. My husband and I have our own rules to obey, too. We don't answer the phone or watch TV during dinner. 5. You have to try one bite.And no more, if what your child tastes makes him or her gag. Like most parents, I have childhood memories of being forced to eat foods that turned my stomach, and I don't want to subject my kids to that. Some moms I know are so worried they won't be able to tell the difference between genuine revulsion and mere stubborness that they let their kids off the hook too quickly. But it has actually turned out to be easy to tell when a dish is truly nauseating to one of my kids. I'll quickly let him know he doesn't have to finish, and praise him for giving it the old try. 6. If all else fails, use bribery (and don't feel guilty).My kids may now be more open-minded about food than most, but that doesn't mean they always like what I've cooked. Heck, I don't always like what I've cooked. But eating it isn't torture. If they start poking food around on their plates, eating a bite of this but none of that or acting stubborn or sulky, we resort to the same bag of tricks that parents have used for generations:
Celia Barbour is the food editor of O: The Oprah Magazine. She lives with her family in Garrison, NY. February Topics
February is the time for Valentines! While the children aren’t required to bring in valentines, you may use the class list on the back of this letter if you decide to have your child bring them in. Valentines Day falls on a Friday, and you are welcome to have your little one bring their Valentines any time the week of the 14th. On Thu and Fri we will send home the children’s Valentine bags that they have decorated. And please, if you choose to include treats, avoid products with nuts since our class is a nut-free zone. This month not only will we celebrate Valentines day, but we also get the opportunitites to talk about the ones we care about—Our friends and family! We will read stories about family and friendship, and learn new ASL signs for these special people in our lives. Kindergarten Readiness While some of our preschool classmates are moving up to kindergarten next year, all of our kiddos will eventually move on. To help your child be ready for this transition, you can do your part by reinforcing those important pre-academic skills with your child. Try to work reading time into your daily schedule—bed time is a great time for this—to show your child that reading and learning is important to you. Use rich descriptive language to model the skill of making observations. Things like color, number, and appearance can be easily worked into conversation. Take time at the grocery store to point out “environmental print.” This is everything from the big C on the Cheerios box, to recognizing the numbers on price tags. Attached you’ll find a kindergarten-readiness article. Start now working on these skills with your little one to best prepare them for the big K! Thank You! We’ve noticed a drop in number and severity of colds and other illnesses in our classroom. I think we can definitely thank our students for good hand-washing, and also you parents for keeping them home when they are too sick to be at school. Thank you for helping us stay healthy here at preschool. We will send out health alerts if any big illnesses/conditions pop up such as influenza, croup, pink-eye, or lice. So far so good, though! University of Idaho Students We’re very lucky this semester to have a University of Idaho student working in our class. This semester, Jordan Proctor joins us as our full-time practicum student. She will be here each day for the semester as she works on her Early Childhood Education degree. This is one of the many perks of being in our wonderful college town! Dates to Remember: · Mon Feb 17th President’s Day, No School Safety is the most basic need of every child. When a child has special needs, it may be even more difficult to make sure that they stay safe. Here is an article from the Ohio Developmental Disabilities Council. It addresses most safety concerns that parents of children with special needs may face. Please take a moment to read through this wonderful article. Winter Clothes
This month we are talking about warm winter clothes. We will talk about the different kinds of winter clothes that we should wear when it’s cold, as well as reading the book, “The Mitten.” When you get your child ready in the morning, you can support our discussions by talking about what your child is wearing, the colors they can find, why we wear warm clothes, and have him/her be more active in dressing themselves. As you know, with the cold weather, warm coats are very important to young children. If you or someone you know needs help purchasing a warm winter coat for a child, you may talk to us about local resources, or contact the organizations below:
We continue to explore many different media of art such as painting, playdough, shaving cream, gluing, and collage materials. If you have any ideas or extra supplies you would like to share with our classroom, please let us know. And as always watch your child’s backpack for the latest and greatest creations! January Topics This month we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day. This is a great time to have conversations with your child at their level which talk about the ways that we are all different, and yet the same in many ways—and that’s a good thing! Take time to help your child notice ways that they are similar to other children (hair color, skin color, size, likes, dislikes, strengths), and ways that they are different. Reinforce the fact that every person is unique and good in their own way! Helping Out Here at Preschool we work every day with the children in helping out. We sing songs during cleanup, and every child is encouraged to help their classmates with picking up, talking, and solving problems. You can help your little helper by giving your child a simple chore to do each day such as shaking out a mat, feeding the cat, wiping a table, or dusting a shelf. This helps build a sense of responsibility and accomplishment as they feel good about themselves for doing something important. Dates to Remember · Mon January 20th: Human Rights Day, No School · Fri January 24th: Teacher Work Day, No School --Developmental Preschool Staff |
AuthorDevelopmental Preschool staff and students. Archives
December 2016
Categories |
Preschool Blog
Stay up to date on the latest and greatest of preschool news and resources.