Each Wednesday, we focus on learning to care for the environment. Children as young as two can begin to learn about the consequences of littering, how to conserve water and energy and the value of replanting trees and plants to replace ones cut down. Look on the monthly curriculum calendar for the theme for the month which may include: Animal Habitats, Rain, Forests, Oceans and Freshwater Habitats, Birds, Waste Watchers and Power from the Sun.
One teacher typically coordinates our Project Green introducing the week's lesson on Monday at the school Community Meeting. (Ages 2-2 ½ have a separate mini-meeting while older twos through Pre K have a more extensive session) The Project Green Coordinator plans activities and consults with teachers to enhance the learning, assure scope and sequence and organize materials that may be needed. Building on an introduction on Monday and a little research on Tuesday, we are ready to do our Project Green Activity on Wednesday. Thursday and Friday are used either as follow up or review days and by Monday we are anxious to start again!
At Bright Beginnings, we believe that learning about Global Community issues and working together to solve problems of our environment can be lots of fun so our activities involve science experiments (rain catchers can tell us how much rain just fell), estimating (how high will a sunflower grow?) and planting and tending gardens.
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CHILDREN'S GARDEN
We are in the planning stage to design and implement a huge Children’s Garden as an extension of our playground at Mill Creek. A former parent, who is a landscape architect, was instrumental in the planning of this project. All of our locations have Children’s Gardens planted and tended by the children. Walk around our locations which are all situated on several acres of property and locate:
- Pizza Pots- Pots of fresh herbs growing for our yummy fresh pizza toppings- basil, parsley and oregano.
- Pizza Patches- A Pizza Patch is a larger area in a garden with “pizza herbs” planted and cultivated for our yummy Pizza Fridays!
- Flowering Pots- Each fall and spring we plan activities around designing and planting in our pots- some classrooms decorate the pots with children’s handprints or colorful tiles, while others choose fun pots.
- Perennial Gardens- We plant and tend child-friendly and fun to watch perennials at the front of our locations. Some classes adopt the garden and others simply enjoy them!
- Teacher Trees- We honor teacher’s anniversaries with Bright Beginnings by choosing and planting a special tree that reminds us of them.
- Adopt-a-Trees- some classrooms choose a classrooom tree in the fall and photograph the children by it each month- what a great way to watch the children and the tree grow!
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434-823-7129
1645 Park Ridge Drive