OCTOBER 2022

 

WELCOME TO OCTOBER!!

Pumpkins, ghosts and bats...OH MY! The hallways are getting spookier by the day!! 

This month we are talking about Autumn (or Fall), Thanksgiving, and Halloween! And I think we will be making some pumpkin spice playdoh!!

Important Dates & Events

OCT. 10 - Thanksgiving: PRESCHOOL CLOSED

OCT. 11 - Samosa Fundraiser Starts

OCT. 23 - Samosa Fundraiser Ends

OCT.27/31 - Children's Halloween Parties

NOV. 1/2 - Photo Days

NOV. 2 - Samosa Pick Up Day (11:30-12:45)

NOV. 3 - Purdys Chocolate Fundraiser Starts

NOV. 11 - Remembrance Day: PRESCHOOL CLOSED

NOV. 17 - Pizza Night & Cake Walk 

NOV. 29 - Purdys Chocolate Fundraiser Ends

DEC. 6-12 - Chocolate Delivery 

Childcare Fee Reduction Initiative (CCFRI)

Starting in December, the amount of your CCFRI rebate will be increasing. The Provincial and Canadian Governments have begun the steps to increase the CCFRI and I will receive more information regarding the specific amounts in the next couple of weeks. Once I have the numbers, I will redo your 3's & 4's fee schedules and send them out to you in November.

Pizza Night & Cake Walk: Nov. 17th, 5:30pm - 7:30pm

Please save the date for this amazing night! The teachers and board members will be cooking up a storm of delicious salads & desserts to go along with our pizza! It is a fun night where your children  can WIN A CAKE! Please think about donating a cake that will either be a prize for the cake walk winners or if you have amazing cake decorating skills,  your cake may be chosen as one of the many cakes we have for our cake auction! (If your child doesn't win a cake, you can keep them happy by trying to get the highest bid!) Bring your loonies to buy your cake walk tickets and prepare to have some fun while getting to know your children's friends and families.

Fundraisers coming up

1.  SAMOSAS - We will be doing our Samosa fundraiser this month and starting on October 11th, you will receive information on how to order. Pick up will be on Nov. 2nd from 11:30-12:45pm

2.  PURDYS CHOCOLATE - We will be doing our Christmas Chocolate Fundraiser again this year!

Our goal this year is $5000! And perhaps we will give a prize to the family that raises the most money! The order forms will go out in November. The order deadline will be Nov. 29th and pick up will be the second week of December. 

What is happening in the CLASSROOMS??

We have had an entire month just FLY BY! The Teachers did so much programming over the last month and the children seemed to be happy and engaged with their friends and the amazing activities!

Please check out the Blog to see what the children got up to in September and please check out the photos so you can see the classroom in action!!

RAINBOW ROOM

Danelle (T/Th), Susan (M/W), Vibha (M-Th)

A big welcome to our new and returning families!  Thank you parents for all your support and patience during gradual entry.  It’s been a great success!

Our youngest members of St. Catherine’s Preschool are beginning to settle in nicely to the program.  Most are happy to stretch their boundaries. A few still need a little more time to feel secure with Mom and Dad leaving.  Such is the nature of our two year olds.  Often this is their first experience away from family.  

Two year olds like to be independent. Favourite words are “mine” and “no” and “I do it”. Emotions take on a roller coaster like quality as 2 year olds can go from excitement to anger to laughter within a few minutes. The most interesting area of child development is their language development and the blossoming of  their speech. Another interesting development is the beginning of pretend play - playing with dolls, dishes and dress-up clothes. 

Some ideas for parents:

-Read to your children everyday. Encourage them to look at books; simple story lines are best.

-Let children help you with simple chores such as picking up toys or putting clothes in the laundry basket.

-Give two’s clear and simple choices: Do you want to drink milk or juice?

-Encourage verbal skills by giving simple directions. 

A little information about our Rainbow Room: 

We setup the rooms in a way that facilitates exploration and discovery through play.  Two year olds love painting, splashing in the water table, playing in the housekeeping corner, and singing and dancing at circle time.  

The month of October we will be talking about Thanksgiving, Fall and Halloween. 

We are still waiting for a few more family photos.  Children love to look at these photos especially if they are missing you

Here’s the song we sing before having snack:

God is great

God is good

And we thank him for our food

We’re going to thank him in the morning, noon and night 

We’re going to thank him coz he’s out of sight 

Amen

We look forward to an exciting year, a year of tremendous growth in confidence and abilities.  We hope that this first group experience will be an enjoyable and memorable one both for you and your child.  At pick up time, please check our white board outside for a synopsis of our day. 

Please feel free to talk to us if you have any questions or concerns.

TREEHOUSE ROOM

Karen (M-F), Gabi (M-F), Rose (T/Th), Carol (T/Th)

Dear returning and new members of our ever growing St. Catherine’s family - welcome to you all. 

Thank you for your trust in us to spend many happy hours, days, months, even years with your young treasures! It’s been a challenging, but rewarding few weeks to get to know all the children, their personalities, their preferences or dislikes. 

One thing for sure is that the children in both of our classes like music with a wide variety of genres and artists. (ABBA is just one interesting choice of a 3 yr old!) 

Our young students always amaze us by how quickly and seemingly effortless they adapt to a new routine, how happy and cheerful they (usually) are. 

It’s just a wild guess, but we noticed that after the general feeling of ‘darkness’ the pandemic caused, the children seem more mature in their self-help skills and more eager to join any group activities. With the negative news that is being presented to us on our TVs and computers, it’s more important than ever to shield our children and their mental, emotional health by being more loving, caring, a bit more happy, a bit more silly. That is our plan for your children this year! 

We started it all off by creating a poster with the children's handprints and then we had a conversation on how to be inclusive and caring and a good friend. 

We practiced good listening skills, and talked about expectations while on the circle carpet. We played games where the children had to pick a good or bad choice in situations that might happen in our classroom . 

We have been practicing how to line up, move safely as a group and to wait patiently for our friends who need more time to finish tasks. Don’t worry, we had lots of fun too when we sang songs, shared many stories, played name games to learn each other’s names, and had a picnic outside just to name a few. 

We learned about Canada, animals native to BC (where one conversation turned into a debate whether a unicorn would qualify as a BC resident). We looked at some beautiful art pieces created by indigenous communities, and the children created their own dream catchers, totem poles and priceless jewelry. We ‘traveled’ in a boat installed in the home corner, had a 'camp fire' roasted 'marshmallows’ and used a flashlight in the dark.

The new mural in the hallway is fantastic and some children love to take more frequent bathroom breaks just to look at it. Please ask your children what animals they can name that live in our province that are also painted on the wall!

The weather has been fantastic so far, but please remember to dress your children in layers as the mornings are chilly and the playground could be wet. Extra clothes in their backpacks would also be appreciated.

Please feel free to reach out to us with any questions or concerns!

SUNFLOWER ROOM

Carol (MWF), Danielle (MWF), Rose (MWF)

Welcome back Everyone! We are very excited and happy to meet some new and old friends in our Sunflower Classroom.

Over the next 10 months, we have lots of learning, playing and discovering new things planned. We will be making new friends, exploring with art and learning to listen and understand new things at circle time.

For the first week of School, we spent lots of time playing and learning about our new classroom & friends. We sang name games and action rhymes. We also talked about our number one rule “No-one Gets Hurt” & we read “What does it mean to be Kind?’.  For art we used our hands to decorate our Sunflower poster. We listened to the felt story ‘Leo the Lion’ and heard how a tiny mouse could make friends with a lion. We also introduced the game ‘Stop & Go’, where we used pictures of things that are a stop or a go… We read ‘The Kissing Hand’ and used diffusing paper to make matching handprints.

We moved onto exploring Ourselves and our Families. For circle we talked about who lives in our house and what color hair/eyes we had. We read ‘Whoever you are’ & ‘I’m Like You, You’re Like Me’. For art we used a mirror to work out what color eyes & hair we have, where our nose & lips go to make a self-portrait.  We used rectangles and triangles to make our own houses – some were small, some wide and some were tall. In the water table we had small houses and people to play with. We had babies and baby stuff in the home corner.

For the last week of September, we listened to the CD stories about ‘Pete the Cat’. Two of the popular stories were ‘Pete the Cat and his Groovy Buttons’ & Pete the Cat & His White Shoes.’ We had fun singing along to the CD stories and acting out being a ‘cat’. We played the game ‘Find the shoe’ and “What color jacket is missing?’ We made shoe prints with blue, red & white paint and decorated Pete the Cat with glue, paint and whiskers.  We were ‘Vets’ in the home corner with stuffed cats & dogs and matched colored shoes on the light table.  In the water table we got to mix ‘colored shaving cream’ and add buttons to our creations.

In October we will be talking about Thanksgiving, Fall and Halloween.

Please remember to pack more food than less (one container for snack & one for lunch) as we are here for 4 hours a day, so the children get hungry.  We have seen some yummy lunch/snack suggestions over the last few weeks. For e.g. veggies & dip, grilled cheese sandwich, boiled eggs, pasta in a thermos, waffles & sushi. So much variety makes the teachers want to upgrade their lunches 😊.  We will also be going outside to play when it’s not raining, so pack appropriate footwear & jackets.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact the office so we can arrange a meeting after school hours. 

RESOURCE OFFICE

Marion Porter

Welcome to a new school year.  

Even after 25 years at St. Catherine's I still feel so excited to see the returning families and to meet the new ones.  We are so lucky to be enjoying Summer like weather in October and the children are spending time out in the playground.  

Gradual entry went very smoothly this year and the children have settled into their classrooms and are making friends.  They are getting to know their teachers and their classmates.  

All the children are enjoying welcoming circles and doing fun art activities.  I have been spending time in each classroom and connecting with all the children.  

We encourage the children to work on their self help skills.  They come in, hang up their backpacks and take off their jackets.  Parents can work on some of these skills at home and this will help them be more independent at school.

I will be sharing information about early learning and child development in the monthly Blog.  If you have an questions or concerns, please email the office or give me a call.