BRIGHT BEGINNINGS PRESCHOOL


Experienced Quality Child Care Since 1984


www.brightbeginningsva.com  

Millcreek Newsletter


April 16, 2010

Upcoming Events:
Wednesday, April 21st Staff Appreciation Day
Friday, April 23rd Children’s Night Out, “Singing in the Rain!”

Friday, May 7^th, Children’s Night Out, “Down on the Farm”

Monday, May 10^th, Spring Semester Evaluations distributed

Sunday, May 16^th, Family Picnic & Art Show: 4-6 pm

School Notes and News

We had a wonderful but hot day week at Bright Beginnings. The mornings have been a little chilly but please make sure the children have extra summer clothes that they can change into before outside time. Drop off time can be a little crazy since all of the classes are combining into single classrooms and kids are seeing friends that they do not normally see. We are helping by making sure that activities are happening during those times but we have something that you could do to help us out! Please make sure that you drop off your child(ren)’s stuff in their classroom first and then bring them to the classroom they are usually in at drop-off . It makes it easier for the teachers so that they do not have to keep track of whose stuff is whose and also it makes it easier at the end of the day when you need to get all of your child(ren)’s stuff! Thanks so much for your help! Also, do not forget to sign up for CNO, “Singing in the Rain,” is the theme and it is with Ms. Danielle and Ms. Erin!

Financial Memo

Spring cleaning? Children’s Night Out is a great way to have some extra hours to yourself to get things done around the house. Check out the yearly calendar for upcoming dates and sign up at the front desk!

Simplify your life with Automatic Credit Card payments for tuition.  Complete an authorization form and we'll take care of the rest!

 Speech Weekly

 Toddlers and young 2’s

We began by reading “Moo Ba La La La” and “Barnyard Dance” while focusing on animal sounds.  We “read” sentence strips with pictures of animals and sounds.  The children were encouraged to “read” the sentence strips (3 pictures).  We cut up pretend fruit and gave it to our doggy.  We worked on sign language throughout the entire session.  The bubble machine was used at the end of our session. 

Older 2’s

We also began by reading “Moo Ba La La La” and “Barnyard Dance” while focusing on animal sounds.  We utilized sentence strips with pictures of animals and sounds.  The children were able to read the “sentence strips” (3 pictures).  We cut up pretend fruit and gave it to our doggy while using 4 word sentences.  We also focused on categorizing animals and shapes with puzzles.  The bubble machine was used at the end of our session.   

3’s and 4’s

  We began buy reading “The Very Quiet Cricket” while learning lots of new vocabulary such as rummaged, ambled, scurried, slithered, gigantic etc.  We also worked on opposites throughout the entire story.  Next we focused primarily on /s/ words in the initial, medial, and final position.  We then colored snakes and made “thick” and “thin” tongues.  In some classrooms we were able to play sound bingo.   

I hope everyone has a fantastic spring break. 
 

                                    Stacy Torrence M.S. CCC-SLP

Reading Weekly

On Tuesday, March 23^rd, the book My Crayons Talk, by Patricia Hubbard, was read to facilitate a discussion of how colors are used by illustrators to help the reader understand more fully the meaning of the story.  The students then used visual literacy skills to help them better understand and appreciate two paintings.  Children who can orally communicate what they visually see or observe are developing language skills that will transfer into writing skills in Elementary school.

Edith H. Fisher

Class Notes

Penguin

Welcome back! I hope everyone enjoyed the long weekend! This week we talked about the letter “Ee”, butterflies, bee’s and lots more. We colored a big E for art then talked about things that start with an E. We made tissue paper butterflies, coffee filter butterflies, bumble bee using black tissue paper on yellow paper and colored a big ant then glued it to paper and added green tissue paper to the bottom. We had a birthday in the Penguin class as well this week. Caleb turned 2! Happy Happy Birthday!

We also worked on our colors, shapes, words, animals and counting to five. We sang lots of new songsto help us out with our colors, counting and shapes. We went fishing on the boat in the gross motor room. We hopped like frogs, played basket ball and blew bubbles! We had lots of fun activities and projects this week. Enjoy your weekend!

Ms. Danielle

Sea Turtles

Welcome back! I hope everyone enjoyed their long weekend. This week we learned about the letter “Ee!” We come up with words like elephant, Eva, egg and Ms. Erin. We learned more about our colors and counting to five. For art we made coffee filter butterflies, colored a bee, made tissue paper art, made rain drops on the letter “Ee” and colored an ant. We enjoyed talking about bees and how they buzz . We made Chex Mix with the Penguin class, which was fun and yummy. Thank you all for bringing in frosting and sprinkles for our cupcakes! They were delicious and fun to decorate! Happy birthday to our Sea Turtle Siena who turned 2 years old on April 15^th. I hope everyone enjoys their weekend and I will see you on Monday!

Ms. Erin

Starfish

In the beginning of the week, we counted, read, acted and made butterflies. In the middle of the week, we talked about bees. We buzzed around like bees, we counted the legs of the bee: six legs. We read How Many Legs and talked about other insects, which we counted their legs in the book too! At the end of the week, we talked about rain and made raindrop mobiles on display. We also had a cooking project! We made oatmeal cookies, yum! Have a great weekend! See you Monday!

Ms. Jennifer

Seals

Hello again from the Seal room. I hope everyone had a fantastic spring break. Glad to see everyone again. This week we we’re back full swing into things. We counted butterflies from a picture. This helped the children practice their counting skills. We reviewed the letters we have talked about and added X and Y. The children practiced matching their written names with their friend’s faces.  We practiced some more on patterns using one shape, two colors, and two different sizes. The children learned about things that live in the sea and reviewed insects. We continued working on our opposites also. This week we also decorated cupcakes and did a cooking project on Friday.

In art we made tissue paper butterflies, where the children used glitter to decorate them. We also made coffee filter butterflies. The children took coffee filters and placed colored water on it to let the colors fade together. Then we took a clothes pin clipped to the filter to make the body. To practice some more fine motor skills the children took Q-tips and placed glue on paper and glued pictures on the paper. To talk about April showers we made a mobile of rain. We used a rain cloud, rain drops, the words April showers, rain gear, and blue glitter. The last art activity we did was ant art. The children design two ant pictures. On the picture the children placed eyes and decorated the ants.

During gross motor we played with bubbles, which helps the children practice using the muscles in their mouths which help them to be able to blow and speak.  The children used some gross motor skills to dance. I used an exercise CD for the children to dance to. The children also played follow the leader by pretending we were different animals and insects.  We also practiced our catch and release skills by playing hot potato. The last thing we played was catch with a ball. We rolled the ball to each child. The children had a choice of who they rolled the ball to. The only catch was the children had to say the other child’s name before they rolled the ball to them.

I hope everyone has a great weekend! I will see everyone next week! Some dates to remember:  Staff Appreciation Day April 21

Next Children’s Night out April 23 “Singing in the Rain”

Ms. Cheri

Dolphin

This week, the Dolphin class has certainly gotten into the swing of spring! We’ve done everything from add and subtract butterflies to writing E’s on our easel to making umbrella and raindrop mobiles to learning about the money from different countries! It was out of this world!

Another great way to celebrate spring is to get out in this great weather! CNO is a great way to do that! Your kids get to hang out with their friends, it’s $15 for the first child and $5 for additional children and it gives you 3 hours of free time! It’s a win-win situation!

For math/science, we did addition and subtraction with butterflies, did math with bees and flowers, talked about Reduce, Reuse and Recycle for Project Green, did a sponge experiment and played shapes bingo.

For letter’s, we read books, wrote E’s on the easel, did letter activities, went on an E scavenger hunt and learned a nursery rhyme!

For art, we made tissue butterflies, created coffee filter butterflies, made bee hive collages, put together umbrella and raindrop collages and made ant art.]

For social studies, we learned about and saw money from different counties and compared them. We also got to see a dress that Ms. Kimberly got in Venezuela.

For humanities, we did lots of playing, had some scarf dancing, made a butterfly play and did a cooking project with oatmeal and animal crackers.

Say a very happy birthday to Sofie (April 6^th), Maria Antonia (April 11^th), Emerson (April 12^th), Ethan (April 13^th) and Matthew (April 28^th).

This week has been so much fun and we can’t wait to celebrate next week with you!

Ms. Kimberly

Walrus

The Walrus class did a great job this week. We were able to incorporate a lot of “springy” things into our activities. The students did a wonderful job making up subtraction and addition problems and telling me everything that I needed in the problems. We drew butterflies, bees and flowers to help us add and take things away. Our tissue butterflies turned out great, which everyone can see in the hallway. We also made some wonderful bee hives that are hanging up in the gross motor room.

The letter we worked on was “E,” and we came up with a great list of words like edible, echo and east! We also focused a lot on our letter sounds by playing sound bingo. The kids found the letters on their boards by listening to the sounds that I gave them.  Everyone did a great job when I asked them about sentences verse single words. I wrote single words and sentences up on our board and they were able to tell me which ones were sentences and which ones were single words. They know that a sentence has to have a period at the end and it needs to be more than one word. We did something a little different with our Ready Readers this week. I asked the children to circle all of the periods and underline each of the words. They did a great job this week and we are looking forward to more warm days to come! Have a wonderful weekend!

Ms. Ryland