Happy First Days!

Prekindergarten has gotten off to a great start.  I am so proud of how brave each and every one of our students has been!  We have had a fun couple of days and I think we are going to have an amazing year.

You can click here to see more pictures from our first day of school!

Routines, Routines, Routines!

We have spent a significant amount of time these last couple of days trying to begin to establish some PreK routines.  Children are more relaxed in their environment when they have a predictable routine set in place.  We will continue to work on establishing our PreK routines over the next month.

Safety

We started talking about Emergency Evacuations this week.  We even began practicing emergency evacuation drills within our classroom.  We are getting ready for a real emergency evacuation practice that will be happening soon with all of the other boys and girls from our school!  I have been talking to your children about the importance of staying together with their PreK teachers and class during an emergency evacuation drill.  I have also been warning them about how loud the emergency evacuation bell is - but that it's okay, it is just loud, not scary.

Pick Up

As we work to find our end of the day and pick up routine, I am asking parents to please make sure a PreK staff member knows you have picked up your child before you leave.  Especially with our afternoon classes when there are kids from other grades going in and out of the school at the same time.

I am working with the students that they need to get their outside shoes or boots on, then line up on the black line and wait until a staff member can help them find their parents.  Thank you for helping us with this process!

Umbrella Breathing

This week I began to teach the students about "umbrella breathing."  Umbrella breathing (deep breathing) is a self regulation tool that can be used for calming yourself when you are upset.  We will be practicing umbrella breathing every day in our classroom using our "breathing bell."  Once the students understand how to umbrella breathe we will work with them to use umbrella breathing as a tool to help calm themselves down if they are upset.

You can click here to see more pictures from our first week of school.

Pete the Cat

Our theme right now is Pete the Cat.  We have been reading "Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes" by Eric Litwin.  I strongly recommend this book if you are looking for a story to enjoy with your child.  Next week we will have Pete themed art and sensory play.

Coming Up

Next week we will continue to enjoy our Pete theme.  We plan to get messy squishing berries and mud just like Pete does in the book!  We will also be working on how to play together, how to clean up after ourselves, as well as emergency evacuation practices.  We will begin going to the gym and library next week as well, although we will not be bringing library books home at this time (maybe the following week).  We will also begin having music classes with Mrs. Stanski.

Important upcoming dates:

• September 27th - Picture day for PreK students (except T/Th kids)
• September 28th - Picture day for the T/Th PreK students
• October 4th and 5th - Early Dismissal Days
• the morning class will dismiss at 10:30 am
• the afternoon class will dismiss at 2:15 pm