Teachers Lisa, Jieshan and Nuria
Week December 13-17 Learning Resource
Message from your teachers!
Welcome to this week’s learning resource! We our continually grateful for all of you and your patience as we work to get our classrooms ready to reopen! We mentioned in the last parent meeting that we are waiting for someone from the Licensing office to check that everything is ready- this is something we do for every school year, but due to the staff shortage we are all feeling across the country, this process is taking longer than we thought. So thank you again for working with us as we get things ready! We are very excited to have this process going, and we will keep you all updated as we get closer to finding a reopen date. If you ever have any questions, concerns or feedback about what’s happening, feel free to contact one of us so we can talk!
Useful Links and Information:
https://childmind.org/article/the-power-of-positive-attention/ this article covers Positive Attention for children. As we get ready to return to preschool, it’s so important to continue supporting children as they begin a new routine.
| Teacher Lisa Email: lisap@nhwa.org Work Cell: (206) 480-7230 | Teacher Jieshan Email: jieshant@nhwa.org Work Cell: (206)532-6929 | Teacher Nuria Email: nuriao@nhwa.org Work Cell: (206)532-6927 |
Our four program-wide expectations are Be Compassionate, Be Curious, Be A Community and Be Courageous. This week we will focus on how children can Be A Community.
We are A Community when we:
- Are kind to one another
- Take care of one another
- Embrace our differences and cultures
- Share what we know and care about
- Solve problems together
In this week’s learning resource, you’ll find an activity related to this week’s expectation. Let us know how it went!
Social Emotional
Be A Community:
All Are Welcome by Alexander Penfold and Suzanne Kaufman
Read this book with your child and talk about the different types of food you see in the book. Talk about the food you eat at home and foods from other cultures that you have tried. Plan to try a new dish together from a culture not of your own. https://video.link/w/TYL3c
Math / Science
Frozen experiments (Science):
Fill different sizes of containers or an ice tray with hot water and place in the freezer. The next day take them out. Talk with your child about what happened to the water? Is it hot or cold? Is it solid or liquid? How does it feel? Soft? Hard? Write down with your child the words he or she describes about the frozen water. Talk about temperature and what makes the water change. You can also watch the frozen water melt.
Younger children can use this as more of a sensory experiment. You can add colors and then freeze the water. Have your child feel and look at the water before and after it freezes. You can also pour the water in different shapes or letter forms.
Language / Literacy
Today’s News
This activity can help your child with reading and writing as well as learning about routines!
Today’s News
Primary Objectives
Uses print concepts
Why it’s important
Children learn to understand written words when the context is interesting or familiar to them. Writing down and discussing a plan for the day will help your child think about what types of things they want to do and accomplish.
Materials
Large piece of paper, markers
What you do
1. Talk with you child about some of the things you are planning to the next day. You can discuss what kinds of chores you will be doing, what errands you will run, which books you will read together, what you will have for dinner, etc.
2. The next day, explain that you are going to make a newspaper to read with your child. Write “Today’s News” at the top of a large piece of paper. Underneath the heading, write what will happen that day. Today at lunch time we will have tuna salad. Before bed we will read Goldilocks and the 3 Bears.
3. When you are finished writing, encourage your child to read the “news” with you. Encourage them to follow along by moving their hand under the words are you read. It says, “Today, at story time, we will read…”
4. Listen to the comments your child makes about the news. Talk about familiar features of the print. Comment on her observations. Yes, we stop reading when we get to the period. The next word starts with an uppercase letter. That’s the beginning of the next sentence.
5. After reading the news together, invite your child to choose what she would like to do first or which book she would like to read. Encourage them to point out her choice on the paper.
6. At the end of the day, invite them to go back to the newspaper and see which things they did that day. Before bed, talk about what will be in tomorrow’s newspaper.
Art / Writing
This is a short video showing how you can make a paper snowflake- all you need are paper and safe scissors!
Movement / Play
Dance those wiggles out!
Want to help your child get some energy out? Put on a favorite song and dance! If you want to make it extra fun, you can pause the song at random times so they have to freeze like a statue! You can do this with any song that you and your family enjoy, which is what makes it one of the most fun things to do with your child!
