SPRING HAS SPRUNG...a leak!!!
Winter is officially over so get ready for the APRIL SHOWERS!! And get ready for all the fun we have planned in the upcoming weeks!! Only 3 months left of this school year!! Check out the important dates to remember...
UPCOMING EVENTS
April 10 - Easter Service & Tea - 10:30 am - (302/402)
April 11 - Easter Service & Tea - 10:30 am - (301/401)
- 1:45 pm - (403)
Apr. 30 - May 4 - Jeans Week
May 11 - Staff Pro D Day - PRESCHOOL CLOSED
May 15/16 - Music Open House (times TBD)
May 21 - Victoria Day - PRESCHOOL CLOSED
June 15 - 4's Graduation
June 15 - Last Day Preschool Classes
June 18/19 - Picnics
Didn't anyone tell you what happened last month?? Well!! Check it out here:
DISCOVERY TWOS - Arsi, Brita, Danielle, Susan, Vibha
We
hope you all had a wonderful spring break. Welcome back Danielle. A
huge thank you to Marion for all her help and support while Danielle was
recovering from her injury.
What
a fun, busy and exciting month of March we had talking about farm animals.
Here are few of our art activities that the children really enjoyed:
Group art painting the big red barn, pigs in the mud with brown paint and
coffee grinds, glittery ducks, paper plate cows and gluing cotton balls on
sheep.
At
circle time we sang many farm animal songs with our favourite being Old MacDonald Had a Farm where the children got so excited naming animals and making the
sounds. Our 2s enjoyed Cows in the Kitchen, Big Red Barn and Old MacDonald Had a Truck books. We also did some yoga poses: cat, cow, front and
butterfly poses.
Last
week of March we focused on Easter.
Over the past few weeks we have
noticed that our little twos are growing up to be great little threes.
We are seeing them work so well together. Their play is starting to
incorporate more and more children. As teachers, we are always looking
for ways to bring new and exciting experiences to the classroom, to enhance
this process. The most exciting area is Language Development and the
blossoming of speech. Another interesting development is the beginning of
pretend play- playing with dolls, dishes and dress-up clothes.
Some Ideas for Parents:
Read aloud to children
everyday. Simple story lines are best.
Let children help you with
simple chores such as picking up toys or putting clothes in the laundry basket.
Encourage them to name things that you are using.
Add new information to what a
child is saying "Yes, that's a blanket, a soft warm blanket.
Give clear and simple
choices. "Do you want to drink milk or juice?"
As always, please come and
talk to us if you have any concerns.
301 - Estelle & Susan
Happy Spring everyone!
March has been a very
successful month here in 301. We were able to celebrate the beginning of
spring. We created caterpillars out of egg cartons and then butterflies from
coffee filters. We enjoy using recycled materials here in the classroom to
teach the students about reusing and caring for our environment.
Speaking of
environment, the classroom and school is looking particularly spring like.
Please take the time to look at your children's art which is displayed on both the
classroom boards and hallway boards.
On our last day before Spring Break we
celebrated St Patrick’s Day by stamping with marshmallows on to green shamrocks.
This yummy treat was a fun way to cap off our last day.
Our school was closed
for one week which allowed all of us to relax and take some time to enjoy the
upcoming season. The Easter services are just around the corner so our class
has been practicing songs and actions. We are very excited to present our hard
work to the parents and families at our Easter services! We are looking forward to
seeing you all there!
302 - Karen, Carol, Brita & Lisa
For the month of March we talked
about all things to do with Easter. We decorated paper eggs, real eggs, made
baskets for our Easter egg hunt and made paper plate bunny masks.
On
the 29th, the Easter Bunny paid us a visit and hid chocolate eggs for the
children to find. Each child found 3 eggs and they could hardly contain themselves as I read the letter from the E.B. that was left on our classroom door.
We
have started singing songs in music for our Easter Service that will be held on
April 10th in the Church at 10:30 am with a Tea to follow in the gym. The Tea is
a great social time to sit and chat with other parents while enjoying tea and
cucumber sandwiches.
We
would like to welcome our two new teachers to our class: Carol and Lisa. Please
come and introduce yourself.
We
hope you all had an enjoyable Spring Break and a Happy Easter.
401 - Karen & Rosie
Welcome back to our 401 blog.
We
focused on letters and numbers for a portion of this month. Our room was full
of different games, books, puzzles and many more things pertaining to a better
understanding of letter and numbers that we use everyday. We will continue our Kindergarten
readiness till the end of the year so please let us know if you have any
questions about this program.
Thank
you to those children who attended our traditional skating party at Harry
Jerome. It was great to see you there on the ice. We hope everyone got to enjoy a
cookie and some hot chocolate.
We
hope you enjoyed your week off for Spring Break as we did. Upon our return, the
Easter Bunny came to St. Catherine’s and hid eggs around our room. It was so cute to
see how excited the children were getting as Rosie read the note that the
Easter Bunny had left.
For
the month of April, we will be talking about Spring babies, seeds, planting,
growing and preparing for our Easter Service held on Wednesday the 11th @
10:30am in the Church with a special Tea afterwards in the gym.
402 - Arsi, Danielle & Rosie
Graduation is just around the corner, so we’ve stepped up our kindergarten readiness this month. We have been learning our alphabet and what sound(s) each letter makes. We have been tracing the letters each week by using dot to dot or following numbers. By doing so, we have also started to use our pincer grip to write. It is really important for the boys to practice this grip at home as well for this will help them when they begin writing more in kindergarten. Furthermore, this allows them to use their fine motor skills and hand eye coordination when it comes to other activities. We would like to encourage parents to keep practicing the letters at home. This may be in the form of dot to dot tracing letters or just pointing out letters you may see around the house/grocery store (on a toy box, sign,poster etc). When it feels like a game, it’s more fun to learn!
The boys have also worked really hard on the letters of their names and writing their names. We are encouraging them to write their own name on their art at school. This can also be extending at home by drawing, painting, or even printing on a birthday card. A fun activity is writing their name in shaving cream on a cookie sheet! (Easy clean up too!)
Some of the activities we did to incorporate the alphabet this month:
*find the matching upper and lower case letters
*guess which letter is missing
*find the friend with the matching upper\lower case letter
*think of a word that starts with the letter of the day during attendance
Some of the books we read:
*Egg *Billy Goats Gruff *Go Helicopter Go
*Elephant’s Story *My Dad is a Giant
*Friendshape *The Little Red Hen
We also had Patty do some great art with the boys as part of her practicum. She has had the boys trace, draw, paint, sponge, and they even used eggshells to make various animals starting with the letter of the day. The boys were super busy!
We hope all the families that came out for our 4’s skating party had a fun time! It’s such a great
event for our families to spend some time on the ice and than warm up with some yummy hot
chocolate!
After Spring Break, we hopped our way into Easter! We painted paper plates and made them into our Easter baskets! You can’t have Easter without decorating eggs! Furthermore, we had a special visit from the Easter Bunny who left us some treats to hunt! What a fun time! We would like to wish all our families a Hoppy Easter!
In the upcoming weeks, we will continue to work on our alphabet and other aspects of
kindergarten readiness! If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to talk to us!
304/403 - Estelle, Karen, Rosie & Susan
Greetings parents of 403. We know March
is behind us but lets recap the fun stuff we did.
We talked about Friendship
and Easter. For art we made a paper flower picture, Easter baskets, chicks
coming of eggs and we decorated paper eggs and real eggs.
The
Easter Bunny came by and hid chocolate eggs in our playground and the children we
so excited! 
We
are presently preparing for our Easter Service that the children will be
performing on April 11th at 10:30 am in the Church with a Tea to follow in the
gym. The Tea is a great time to sit and socialize with other parents while
enjoying tea and cucumber sandwiches.
We
hope you all had a relaxing Spring Break and a Happy Easter.
MUSIC - Rachel
The month of March has been spent
preparing for our Easter Services in April. We have been learning lots of new
songs about all thing Spring, and have also been practicing the moves to a very
special dance! We can’t wait to show off all our hard work on April 10th and 11th and celebrate our success together with a Tea Party.
If you are reading this sentence, please make a comment below and let us know what class your child is in and they will win a small prize!
RESOURCE OFFICE - Marion
Hope everyone had a nice Spring Break and a lovely
Easter.
We are looking forward to our Services on the 10th and
11th. Rachel started teaching the children their songs in
March and the teachers have been rehearsing at circle time. A special Tea
will be served following each Service for the families and friends.
We
are getting into Spring and learning about new life. I have our 30
caterpillars on order and hopefully they will arrive early May and be ready for
release early June.
I have been talking with the teachers and spending
time in the various classrooms. I have been observing lots of cutting
with scissors and printing with pencils and markers.
The 4s are
busy in the classrooms counting, spelling, sequencing and matching. The
2s and 3s are learning to verbally express their needs. It is important
to acknowledge your child’s attempts to communicate with you. You can
model language for them and ask open ended questions. Always give them
some time to process your request and to respond. Following through with
expectations is important and teaches your child that there are consequences
for their actions.
REGISTRATION - SUMMER PROGRAM:
Monday, April 16th,
2018 beginning at 8:15 am.
We will be running our exciting “Down on the
Farm” for 4 weeks in July.
Because of the holiday Monday, July 2nd
we will start Tuesday to Friday, July 3rd- 6th, then
Monday to Thursday, July 9th-12th, July 16th-19th,
July 23-26th.
Morning sessions run 9-12 noon and afternoon
sessions run 1-4 pm. Mornings fill up quickly so register early.
Registration is open to all families on the North Shore, so ask you neighbours
to join us for a fun time.
“Messy” Easter Church will be held on Wednesday, April 18th
(5-6:30 pm). This special time is filled with songs, crafts, games, and a
story followed by dinner. Bring your family and friends (Ages 0-upwards).