We are MARCH-ing into the next month!!
Winter will officially be over this month so we will SPRING into action and begin preparations!!
Measles: Parents and Caregivers, please check your emails and our bulletin boards for the Measles Outbreak information sheet that was sent to us from Vancouver Coastal Health.
Diarrhea & Vomiting: If your child has had a loose bowel movement within the last 24 hours they should not be at school. If it is accompanied with vomiting and fever, they cannot return until 48 hours after the last solid BM and they are fever free and medicine free for over 24 hours.
Important Dates and Events
MAR 5 - Church Pancake Supper
MAR 8 - 4's Skating Party - see notices on BB & email
MAR 18-22 - Spring Break - PRESCHOOL CLOSED
APR 10/11 - Easter Services & Tea (3s & 4s)
APR 19 - Good Friday - PRESCHOOL CLOSED
APR 22 - Easter Monday - PRESCHOOL CLOSED
Scholastic Books - Use the code CLIFFORD when you make an online order over $30 and you will receive a free book!
Lovable Labels - Don't forget about our ongoing label fundraiser! Just go to www.StCatherines.lovablelabels.ca and you can order labels for lunch boxes, clothes, etc. There are stickers, iron-ons, stainless steel and even zipper tags!
The Card Project - For our Spring Fundraiser, your children have all created beautiful art projects that can be turned into cards, books and other materials!
Check your cubbies soon for your child's art work and personalized order sheet. You can go online to see what this is all about: www.TheCardProject.ca
DID YOU HEAR WHAT HAPPENED IN YOUR CHILD'S CLASS THIS MONTH?? Look below!
Marion has something to tell you all....please read her submission below in the RESOURCE OFFICE's blog.
DISCOVERY TWOS - BRITA, DANIELLE, VIBHA
February was a busy month where we focused on love, friends
and our senses. The children were very hard at work exploring,
playing alongside each other and learning new things.
We started with ‘Chinese New Year’, the Year of the
Pig. We used red, black and gold with a
salad spinner. For circle we read “Happy Chinese New Year’ and listened to the
felt rhyme ‘5 Red & Gold Dragons'. We also danced with scarves to music with
Chinese instruments.
We moved on to Valentine’s Day. For circle we spent time listening to Felt
Rhymes ‘5 Currant Buns’ & ‘Jelly Bean, Jelly Bean What do you See?’ We played Color Recognition Games with
Colored Hearts & Hide & Seek with Hearts. We sang, acted & read the
story “Skidamarink’. We also read ‘Puppy
in Love & Valentine’s Day’. On Wednesday’s we enjoy music time with
Tiffany, who sang Valentine songs and played instruments with us.
For art we have been busy using cookie cutters, glitter and
paint to decorate hearts. We also used
our hand prints to make ‘Heart Butterflies’.
We finished up with our Valentine’s Day party. We dressed up in Red, White & Pink and
some of us had our face painted. Thank you to the parents who provided the
snacks.
For the last two weeks we explored our senses especially at
the art and water table area. We played
with ‘snow’ and ‘shaving cream’. We used
potato mashers and paint to make different patterns. We used sponges/foam & our fingers to
explore paint and how it feels. We also
used water color & salt and watched how the paint changed on the paper.
We have also spent time in the home corner ‘shopping’. We have had baskets, shopping carts, cash
registers, bags and of course ‘food’ to play with. This has been a great opportunity for the
children to take turns filling their carts up and ‘buying’ things. But the most fun is pushing the carts around the
room.
We are looking forward to the next fun filled few months and
we are moving onto Bugs for the next few weeks.
Just a reminder that if you are starting toilet training,
please let us know as consistency is key.
We also will go outside if the weather permits so please
make sure to dress for the conditions.
CLASS 301 - CAROL, SUSAN
The month of February
was short but busy at the preschool. We began the month celebrating Chinese New
Year, the Year of the Pig. The Treehouse room was decorated with traditional
Chinese signage and paper lanterns. The children played with rice and chop sticks
in the classroom. This emphasis on a different culture allowed each child the
chance to see how other food is eaten, how music is played and the significance of
celebrations.
Once Chinese New Year was finished, we flowed nicely into Valentine’s
day. Valentine’s day festivities always bring excitement to the preschool; parties are coming up and beautiful and cheery decorations fill our classroom.
One very significant art that is always created for Valentine’s day is special
bags to collect Valentines. These bags are always a highlight for the children
to create and display in their cubbies. This year our Valentine's parties were
a great success. The children were adorable in their pink and red clothing and they seemed to enjoy the various food items. Thank you to all the parents that contributed
to the party.
The theme of Love always leads nicely into teaching about feelings and
friends. Within this theme we are able to provide group art activities such as
creating a mural together with paint.
A very important art activity/fundraiser that takes
place in the school each year is the Card Project. The card
project is a very successful fundraiser for the preschool. The children love
creating their own art which will then be turned into a beautiful card. Each
child worked hard to create a masterpiece and we can’t wait for the parents to see
the final product. You will have the option to purchase items with your child's art on it (cards, books, etc)
In the Treehouse room
the teachers take pride in creating fun and exciting explorations for the
students in the House Corner. Over the past month the House Corner has been a
sensory area. This has given the children the chance to explore textures,
movements and sounds. The children seemed to love exploring the sensory area
and we can’t wait to see what the corner becomes next so stay tuned!
Up next in
our classroom is the exploration of literacy. This theme will encourage
reading, word comprehension, imaginative thinking and one on one time to name a
few.
Some housekeeping notes we would like to mention:
1. Please be on time to
pick up your children. It is important to give yourself enough time to get to
the school and be waiting for your child when the door opens.
2. Please be advised
that the school is closed the first week of the District Spring break, March
18-22. We are open the second week
of the District Spring break.
We look forward to the signs of Spring in March
and learning with your children!
CLASS 302/404 - KAREN, SUSAN, CAROL
The month of February
was short but busy at the preschool. We began the month celebrating Chinese New
Year, the Year of the Pig. The Treehouse room was decorated with traditional
Chinese signage and paper lanterns. The children played with rice and chop
sticks in the classroom. This emphasis on a different culture allowed each
child the chance to see how other food is eaten, how music is played and the significance
of celebrations.
This time of year is also a time for another fun holiday: Valentine’s day! Here at the preschool we are always very festive with bright
pink, red and purple decorations and art displayed around the preschool. A
highlight was creating Valentine’s bags. These bags are hung in each child’s
cubby. These bags are not just bags, rather they are the highlight of each
child's Valentine’s day! We love seeing
the children proud to distribute their creations to their friends.
Once the
hype of Valentine's was over, we moved nicely into the theme of Friends and Feelings. Within this theme we are able to provide group art activities such as
creating a mural together at the art table. These polka dot group pieces were displayed in different areas of the school.
Another fun art activity we did was shaving cream art! Please take the time to see these displayed in your hallway.
A very important art activity that takes place in the school each year is the
creation of the Card Project. The Card Project is a very successful fundraiser
for the preschool. The children love creating their own art which will then be
turned into a beautiful card. You will also have the opportunity to purchase other gift cards, notebooks or sketchbooks that are adorned with your child's artwork. Each child worked hard to create a masterpiece and we can’t wait for the parents to see the final product.
In the Treehouse room
the teachers take the time to create stimulating play spaces for the students.
Two highlights within the classroom this month was the home corner becoming a sensory
area where the children were able to feel, see and smell many different objects as well as an ice cream shop set up in our classroom. The children
loved using the cash machine as well as serving ice cream to their friends.
Some housekeeping notes we would like to mention is please be on time to pick
up your children. It is important to give yourself enough time to get to the
school and be waiting for your child when the door opens. Please be
advised that the school is closed the first week of the District Spring break,
march 18-22. We are open the second week
of the District Spring break.
We look forward to the signs of Spring in March
and learning with your children!
CLASS 401 - ARSI, KAREN, VIBHA, LISA, MARJAN
Hello parents of 401. Thanks for taking the time to read our blog.
February…. We started off the month talking about Chinese New Year. For art we made red Chinese paper lanterns. We had rice in the water table, read about what Chinese New Year is all about and at the end of class each child was given a red envelope with a chocolate coin.
On February 13th we had our Valentine's celebration and a big thank you to all the parents that brought food to share at our party. Since this was a month about love we talked about friendship and what it means to be a friend and what we love. For art we decorated bags to put the children's Valentine cards in and did heart stamping with cookie cutters. At circle we read The Day it Rained Hearts, Bear and Bird, and we played a felt board game with hearts and a feelings game.
For the past few weeks we have been working on our annual CARD PROJECT. This year the children used red, blue, green and yellow watercolours on diffusing paper. Once it dried the children cut the paper into pieces and then arranged them on another piece of paper. This project is a great way to support your child’s art and share it with friends in a card form or notebook. Partial proceeds also go toward the preschool. Thanks for your support😊.
Next we started on shapes….circles, squares, triangles and rectangles. For art the children cut out rectangles to make a paper robot and matched shapes to the correct spots. We read Scribble and many books about all the shapes. We sang rhymes about shapes and played a game about what shapes are missing. For our last day we reviewed all the shapes we talked about.
Just a few reminders….
*Our start time for class is 9:00 am and end time is 11:30 am.
*Echo has now been going home with the children for the weekend. We ask that you have Echo returned Monday as it is part of our morning circle.
*A great way to better support your child is to practice some self help skills.
- putting jackets on and zipping them up.
- showing your child the containers their snacks are in and get them to practice opening them.
With these self help skills mentioned we also support them at preschool.
If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to ask.
CLASS 402 - ARSI, DANIELLE, MARJAN
For the Month of February, we started with Chinese New Year,
the Year of the Pig. We listened to the story ‘Happy Chinese New Year’ and
listened to the felt rhyme ‘5 Red & Gold Dragons. We also made our own
dragon and danced in our own parade. We tried our hand at writing some Chinese
Characters.
We then started to talk about Valentine’s Day; how we love
our family and friends. We read the felt story ‘The Lonely Heart’ and books
“Friendshape & ‘Skidamarink’. We
also read stories about being kind to one another and helping friends. We
guessed which color heart was missing and matched different hearts as a team. We
played the game ‘Heart, Heart, Love’ and freeze danced to ‘love songs’. We made
Heart Wreathes, a Penguin Heart Collage and A Friendship Collage. A fun art was using shaving cream, water
color & mixing it all together with a Popsicle stick. We even had fun in the water table playing
with snow….it was a bit of a surprise for February!
We finished Valentine’s Week with a great party. Thank you
to the parents who provided the Party food! A fun time was had by all.
We moved
onto learning about the Author & Illustrator Eric Carle. We spent time exploring how he used tissue
paper and paint to make his pictures. We
read many of his books but we spent time with “The Hungry Caterpillar”, “The
Very Busy Spider”, “The Greedy Python”, “The Lonely Firefly”’ “Papa Please
Bring me the Moon” & “Little Cloud”. With these stories we explored and
experimented with tissue paper to try to create something similar to his
pictures. We used paint, tissue paper,
bleeding tissue paper & water. We
had lots of fun watching the picture take shape.
In the next month we will start learning our Alphabet and
looking into Kindergarten Readiness. A
big part of this is independence. We
will, and hope you will be too, encouraging them to help themselves more as they get ready for
kindergarten eg: putting on their own jackets, opening & closing their own
snacks.
CLASS 403/304 - KAREN, SUSAN, BRITA, CAROL
The month of February
was short but sweet and we also were very productive.
In the preschool we
celebrated two holidays. The first was Chinese New Year. The Treehouse room was
decorated with traditional Chinese signage and paper lanterns. Secondly, we
celebrated Valentine’s Day. The children created heart people as this is always
a fun Valentine’s Day craft.
The highlight of this holiday for the teachers and
children is always the parties. We love seeing the children in their pink, red
and Valentine’s day outfits. Thank you to all the parents who contributed to
the parties. The children always love the food!
In the afternoon classes we
participate in “Fun Friday”. This is a time for the children to celebrate the
weekend being near. We celebrate with a baking or a cooking activity, a short
video or a neighborhood walk. This past “Fun Friday” we were all able to get
outside and enjoy the sun on a stroll through the neighborhood.
A very
important art activity that takes place in the school each year is the creation
of the Card Project. The Card Project is a very successful fundraiser for the
preschool. The children love creating their own art which will then be turned
into a beautiful card. Each child worked hard to create a masterpiece and we can’t
wait for the parents to see the final product. Parents will get an opportunity to purchase more greeting cards, sketchbooks or notebooks with their child's artwork!
In the Treehouse room the teachers take pride in creating fun and
exciting explorations for the students in the house corner. Over the past month
the house corner has been a sensory area. This has given the children the
chance to explore textures, movements and sounds. The children seemed to love
exploring the sensory area and we can’t wait to see what the corner becomes
next so stay tuned!
Some housekeeping notes we would like to mention is please be
on time to pick up your children. It is important to give yourself enough time
to get to the school and be waiting for your child once the door has opened.
Please be advised that the school is closed the first week of the District Spring break, March 18-22. We are open
the second week of the District Spring break.
We look forward to the signs
of Spring in March and learning with your children!
MUSIC PROGRAM - TIFFANY
Spring has sprung and we cannot be more excited about it!
We are singing songs about plants and the weather.
Last month, we focused on tempo and keeping the beat with help from the rhythm family. We learned how to make a circle and walk
left, then right. We also got to notate and play ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’
on Boom-whackers. We never boom-whack our friends though! Furthermore, we used egg
shakers to sing about a Chicken with a shaky egg and we got to play it cool
with the tune, ‘Shh Shh Fingers’.
This month we are going to focus on singing in unison and
we will also be working on our stage presence, smiling and singing loud and
proud.
We will be spending most of our month preparing for our
Easter Services in April and we look forward to showcasing our talent and
skills!
RESOURCE OFFICE - MARION
Building Joy in Children
Comfort:
- Give each child special
individual time.
- Create and keep alive
good, warm memories through family traditions, photos, special events and
doing things together as a family.
- Smile frequently and
enjoy a good laugh together.
Play:- Find activities you and
your family enjoy doing together.
- Remember ordinary daily
activities, like walks and reading at bedtime, are as important as special
trips and holidays.
- During the first five
years, children need parents and caregivers to provide opportunities for
play, and at times, to join in to provide joyful, spontaneous moments of
fun.
Teach:
- Give children the
opportunity to play with other children.
- Sharing joy with others is very important.
- Children are born not
knowing what is safe and important. In the years before age five,
they need parents and caregivers to provide routines and rules to maintain
safety and respect for others.
- The parents and
caregivers also need to provide consistent consequences and moral
guidance, suitable for the age and temperament of each child, and teach
them how to think, problem solve and communicate their feelings and needs.
Most of these essentials take place in ordinary, everyday
activities at home or at the preschool. The important thing to
remember is that children need exposure to all three of these essentials.
Speaking of JOY! Our Summer Program registration will
begin on Monday, April 15th.
This summer the children will be
blasting off to “Outer Space”.
The program runs for 4 weeks in July
starting on Tuesday, July 2nd.
The first week will run Tuesday
to Friday the 5th.
Then run Monday through Thursday (July 8th-11th
; July 15th-18th and July 22nd-25th.
Morning sessions are from 9 am – 12 noon and afternoons from 1 – 4 pm at a cost
of $110.
This program is open to children 3-6 years of age and it open to
the whole community so bring a friend along.
Thank you so much for reading our Blog!
As usual, please let us know each time your child will be absent from school. Let us know when you will be off on holidays or if you will be taking extra time off at Spring Break to help us with staffing schedules and class projects. And if your child is away sick or was sick over the weekend, please let us know so we can better assist the children and families in our preschool.
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