Good morning families!
Welcome to the first day of learning from home! As it is the first day, we are still working some things out, but we will all work together to figure it out (i.e. let us know if a link isn’t working, etc.) One thing that can feel helpful for you and your child during this time of uncertainty is structure. Structuring your days so that they follow a similar schedule every day can feel grounding for both you and your child. If you would like, you can follow a similar format as our daily schedule, but please adapt it to fit your needs:
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8:30-9:30 |
Arrival and Outside time |
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9:30-10:10 |
Snack and Story time |
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10:10-10:25 |
Meeting |
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10:25-11:05 |
Centers |
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11:05-11:15 |
Clean up and reflection meeting |
|
11:15-11:45 |
Common room / Outside time |
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11:45-12:15 |
Lunch |
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12:15-12:30 |
Outside time and Pick-up |
Read aloud: Join Teacher Patricia for a read aloud “Caps for Sale: A Tale of a Peddler Some Monkeys and Their Monkey Business” by Esphyr Slobodkina
An activity for today: Write to friends or teachers! After seeing what everyone did this weekend, you can write down a response from your child to other children or to their teachers, asking questions or commenting on what they did this weekend. Kids are always welcome to write a letter or send a video message to their teachers and we will make sure to respond! You can find the family contact list here.
An activity for today: Writing out and creating your own daily schedule! Collaborate with your kiddo to write out a daily “School at Home” schedule on a big piece of paper. Discuss how your mornings usually look as a family, what they usually do at school, and ask them what they would like to include in their days! Perhaps they want to go on a walk every day, or have special time with a pet. Add those things in. Draw pictures on your schedule so that kids can have visual cues to know which part of the day is which.
Check out this collaborative document where families are encouraged to share ideas for School at Home! (Some family schedules are posted already!)
Daily schedule ideas from Jarrod and Carrie: Start the day with a family morning meeting, where you’ll talk about what the day will hold (and, ideally, sing a song or two). Have a designated snack time, and activity time, and (if at all possible) outside time. Read with your child, at least 20 minutes every day. If there’s more than one adult in the house, plan which parts of the day each of you will be in charge of child care, and which parts you can each get work and/or self-care done. But predictable schedules really, truly help. Most young children find predictable routines comforting and organizing. (For that matter, so do most adults.)
An activity for today: Singing! Listen to Teacher Rachel and her family sing “The Green Grass Grows All Around”, sing along, and sing your own songs together! If you want, send in a video of your family singing a song together! (You can sing the same song as Teacher Rachel or a different one!)
Every day, we will be sending out videos, read alouds, and activity ideas. Please adapt them to work for your family — not every activity will work, and that’s okay! Some days will go smoothly, some days might be really hard. We’re all working through this together, so please send us any questions, challenges, worries, or ideas you have and please share with one another about what you’re doing at home.
Finally, we are working on a video to answer kids’ questions about staying home / school closing / coronavirus. Please send us any questions your kids have so we can incorporate them!
We know that was a lot of information! We are also sending out a document that is more concise for today’s curriculum, in case that is easier to digest!
We’re looking forward to being in partnership with all of you through this uncertain time.
Warmly,
Rachel Ford and Patricia Houston
