February 2012 PECC Newsletter

Keeping Children and Staff Healthy

Contagious illnesses have arrived and the center is trying to keep rooms, toys and equipment as germ free as possible. It is a responsibility that at times can seem overwhelming with so much illness throughout the metro area. Although we clean and disinfect daily, we need help from you to be successful in maintaining a healthy environment for the children and staff. Some ways parents can help:

>Keeping your child home when s/he has a runny nose that requires frequent wiping from the adult.
>Constant coughing, particularly when the child does not cover his/her mouth with a bended arm when coughing.
>Keeping children home when they have not been fever free (without the aid of medication) for 24 hours.
>Keeping children home who are vomiting or have diarrhea. Children must not have experienced symptoms nor given medication for at least 24 hours.
>If a parent/sibling is ill, please do not bring the well child to his/her class. Please call the center and a staff member will come to your vehicle and bring your child to class or bring your child to you.
>Please let the center know immediately if your child was contagious while at PECC.
>Inform your child’s teacher if your child is taking a prescription medication or an over the counter medication.

Thank you for helping us keep our little ones and staff healthy.

Enrollment for the 2012/2013 PDO/School YearFebruary 13: PECC family enrollment begins
February 21: Community enrollment begins

Enrollment is done on a first come, first serve basis. Questions? Contact Karen Fenton at 913-236-7067 or fenton@prairiebaptist.org.

PECC WILL BE CLOSED MONDAY, FEBRUARY 20 FOR PRESIDENT’S DAY.

Please join us for the Wings of Love Bird Show Wednesday, February 22 in the Big Room 10:00 am
All children enrolled in PECC programming are welcome to attend.

Parents Day Out
PDO I
Wow, it’s February!! January went by so fast and everyone was ready to come back to school after Winter break. We are working on the kiddos becoming more independent this half of the school year. Thank you for having your child put away her/his own lunchbox and walk into our class each day. It really does help them start their day off well in PDO I. We are experiencing great weather and plan on going outside as much as possible this month so please remember to send a jacket/coat each day.

This month we will do Valentine’s Day and dental health activities since February is dental health month. We will easel paint, marble roll hearts, make a handprint Valentine’s picture, paint with a toothbrush and dot paint. We will learn some new songs about Valentine’s and keeping our teeth healthy.

Story and music time is going great. The children sit for longer periods of time now, so we are able to focus more on this activity. “Chicka, Chicka, Boom, Boom” is a class favorite and the kids love to sing “Wheels on the Bus” and “Thumbkin” too. Every child has grown so much over these past few months and all are special to us.

Happy 2nd Birthday to Anna McCaffree, Ellie Denno, Joseph Jeppson and Lucy Hanna!!!!

Blessings,
Ms. Brandi, Ms. Denece and Ms. Nancy

PDO II
It sounds so odd to say that we are full swing into winter when we are still playing outside most days on our playground. In spite of the weather, it is in fact winter, and we are busy in our room doing winter craft activities and hearing winter stories and rhymes! February is such a fun month and we are enjoying our activities.

We are still working on learning skills that will carry over into preschool for your children. Each day we provide opportunities to help with listening skills, lining up, and following directives. During story time we use our hands with hand rhymes (ask your child about the “Five Little Groundhogs”), and during music we are listening and dancing to the “Bean Bag Rock”, and “Going On A Bear Hunt.” Each activity has the goal of enhancing your child’s listening skills, and following directives while providing fun and laughter as well. We talked about Punxatawny Phil, the groundhog, seeing his shadow on Groundhog Day, and painted a picture of him. We will also talk about dental care, as February is Dental Health month. Of course, we will do activities centered around Valentine’s Day!

February is also enrollment month for next year, so if you plan on your child attending preschool or PDO at PECC, now is the time to get your registration forms in! Spots fill up quickly and we don’t want you to miss out.

Here are just a few reminders to help us all have the best daily experience at school. We are experiencing a lot of stomach/respiratory sickness recently. We ask that you truly assess the health of your child before bringing him or her to school each day, in order to keep the spread of the illnesses at a minimum. If your child is feverish, even if only slightly, please keep him/her at home. If your child has a constant cough or a constant running nose, we ask that you not bring him/her to school. We want your child to be comfortable. Thank you for helping us to protect our room from the spread of illness!

Happy Birthday to Eliza Gunkel, Hank Redmond, and Margo Billingsley who turn three years old in February!

Love and Blessings to you!
Ms. Doreen, Ms. Michelle, and Ms. Nancy D.

PDO III
We will be very busy in the month of February. Please DON’T forget to mark your calendars for our PDO III program! The dates are Wednesday, February 8th for the Monday, Wednesday, Friday children, and Thursday, February 9th for the Tuesday/Thursday children. If your child comes on multiple days, please pick the day that works best for your schedule. Both programs are at 9:00 a.m. in our music room. This is really a fun and more “casual” program that the kiddos have been working very, very hard preparing for you. It truly is a joy to watch each one of them expressing themselves. They are so gifted and unique 

We begin the month with our stuffed animal week. The children have so much fun telling the entire group who they brought and we play fun games with them, and sing the teddy bears picnic! Some kiddos like to bring a different animal each day they come and that makes it super-duper FUN!!

Watch for our creative valentine art work – we don’t want to spoil the surprise, but they will be so lovely and we are sure each of you will be honored to receive this precious valentine!

Our next unit is entitled “Who Is On Your Money”? We will learn the value of each coin, just who is on the coin, how much they are worth, and where the money is made. This is a great deal of fun for the kids, and they are not even aware of the math skills that are put into motion.

Dental health week begins on February 21st. This is a week where we will be talking about good dental hygiene, and the important foods that our teeth need to stay healthy, as well as our gums. We will learn the proper way to brush and floss and have fun with the crocodile dentist!!

We end the month and head into March celebrating the birthday of the amazing Dr. Seuss! The children are still asking us when they will see that first inch or two of snow. It appears that EVERYONE wants to go sledding and sip hot cocoa, and perhaps have a snow day! Who knows, do you think it will happen??

Happy February birthdays to our friends Clara Breneman and Dylan Newman 

As always, thank you for the privilege of working with your precious children. If you ever have questions, comments, or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

In partnership,
Ms. Lori, Ms. Janet, & Ms. Rebecca

>Preschool>
Ms. Annye’s classes

“Will you be my Valentine” and “Love is nothing till you give it away, give it away, give it away….you’ll end up having more”. It’s just like a magic penny hold it tight and you won’t have any… lend it, spend it, you’ll have so many they’ll roll all over the floor…” are a couple good valentines song that we have been learning this month.
We have been studying the letters Nn, Oo, Pp, Qq, and will end with Rr before our Spring Break.

Groundhogs Day is always fun, especially when we do Shadow Dancing in Music. Ask your child if the groundhog saw his shadow even though it already feels like Spring.
We will have fun playing Number Bingo, making the numbers 0, 1, and 9 on our letter Nn week. We will also make some pretty Valentine Necklaces and we will talk about nighttime and daytime and what animals are nocturnal.

We were Nightingale birds in music and we even acted out Nursery Rhymes. The children took turns and jumped over the candlestick as they heard their name.
Letter Oo took us to the ocean where we swam like fish and sharks. We even made heart fish and learned what other things are in the ocean. We discussed opposites too!

Pp is for pancakes, getting to wear our PJs to school and reading “If You Give a Pig a Pancake.” I think the best part of the week is pretending to flip the flapjacks as we listen to the story and song. We will study how to have good Dental hygiene and eating healthy. We will brush the letter Pp with toothpaste and toothbrushes! “When you wake up in the morning it’s a quarter of one and you want to have a little fun you brush your teeth”… you brush your teeth.

We always enjoy a PARTY, but especially when everyone becomes the mail carrier and passes out Valentines to their friends. We are learning to sign “Jesus loves the little children.” Be sure to see our friendship quilt out on our wall that our friends will make with their families. This is always a fun family activity as you decorate it together.

Our friends will enjoy a Rodeo on Thursday March 8 where you can dress up like a cowgirl and cowboy and enjoy some root beer floats. We will be making some beautiful rainbows and learn about St. Patrick’s Day which we will celebrate while on Spring Break.

Happy March birthdays to Rose and Roman who will turn four years old!

Ms. Becky’s classes
February and we are playing outside and some of the kids are taking off their jackets!!! Not sure the spring-like weather will continue, we will have to wait and see. We did learn about groundhogs as we read stories about “Groundhog’s Day.”

Our letters in February will be Nn, Oo, Pp and Qq. Our activities will be many and varied. We will do science experiments to learn about why there is nighttime, study the Ocean, what makes popcorn pop and how do we make pink and purple. Outside the classroom you will see our yearly Ocean mural filled with colorful fish and a coral reef. We will focus on language development using opposites and descriptive words while making pancakes. Fine-motor skills will be further developed as we create valentine crafts and clean pennies. We will learn about President’s Lincoln and Washington with President’s Day this month. We will cook and taste pancakes and cherry tarts! We will also wear our Pajamas to school!!!!

Letter Rr will be our letter in March before Spring Break. We will wear western clothes, square dance and enjoy root beer floats on Rodeo Day! What fun!!!! Spring Break will be March 12-16. PECC will be closed that Monday through Friday.

Happy Birthday in February to Shea DiSalvo and to Grace Holland in March!

3-Day Prekindergarten

Ms. Becky’s classes
Today is February 1st and the children were playing outside in the sandbox—most of them with no coat or jacket. Unbelievable!!!!

February will be a busy month including all sorts of learning—Social Studies, Language Development, Math, Science, Reading and Fine-motor. There are so many activities and a real focus and getting ready for Kindergarten. We will be having Parent-Teacher Conferences on Friday the 24th. I will be spending time testing student’s skills and preparing for a time to talk with you about how much your child has learned this past year.

Our letters in February are Nn, Oo, Pp, and Qq. We will be doing science experiments to learn about the earth, the ocean and how colors are made. We will also use descriptive words after reading “The Napping House,” learning about opposites and use our 5 senses while making pancakes. We will also be making cherry tarts—just like the Queen of Hearts. We will read stories, create projects and sing songs about President’s Lincoln and Washington. We will celebrate Valentine’s Day with delivering and receiving cards from friends. We will wear our pajamas to school and read the story “If you Give a Pig a Pancake.” We will also create a friendship quilt with triangles, squares and rectangles.

Prior to Spring Break in March we will wear western clothes for Rodeo Day, Happy Bear will visit and teach us about personal safety and create rainbow reptiles. PECC will be closed March 12-16 for Spring Break.

The children are beginning to look more and more like Kindergarteners. They are getting taller and really making great strides in their interacting with one-another and soaking everything in that we do each day. Smiles abound and it is a delight to be with these children everyday.

Happy Birthday in February to Hailey Szlanfucht, Maggie Neely and Dylan Newman
Happy Birthday in March to Kaitlyn Onea

Ms. Jennifer’s classes
Wow, it’s been great to be able to enjoy some outside time with the children this past month. The children are enjoying being able to play in the sandbox in January!

We have lots of fun activities going on in February. Our Mom’s Nights will be on February 8th (AM class) and February 15th (PM class) at 6:30 p.m. in our classroom. It will be an hour of playing, circle time, art, music, and treats. The children are super excited to bring their moms to school at night. Our Valentine party will be on Monday, February 13th. The children may bring cards for all of their classmates. We will play some games and enjoy frozen yogurt sundaes.

We will focus on the letters Nn , Oo, Pp, and Qq this month. We will also be focusing on the numbers 6 through 10. Some of our activities will include going on a number hunt, hearing the story of Noah’s Ark and making rainbows and ocean pictures after learning about the ocean, playing an “opposites” game, making Valentine cards, and practicing fine motor skills.

For letter Pp we will be wearing our pajamas to school and making pancakes for snack. Yum ! For letter Qq we will be making a friendship quilt and making tarts just like the Queen of Hearts.

On February 22nd we will enjoy the Wings of Love live bird show at 10:00 am. All afternoon children are invited as well. It should be an exciting program. I’m looking forward to sharing your child’s progress with you on conference day, February 24th.

In March, we will focus on the letter Rr the week before Spring Break. We will enjoy a Rodeo Day, playing some rhyming word games and have some St. Patrick’s Day fun.

We have enjoyed all of the “mystery readers” who have visited our classroom this year. Please consider doing this for your child’s class. The children absolutely love it when a loved one shows up to read to the class. Just let me know when you’d like to come read, we are very flexible on the time 

Lastly, thanks so much to all who bring snacks, fresh fruit, and goodies for our holiday parties. I am grateful for your kindness and support. It is a blessing to spend time with your children.

Happy 5th birthday to: Juniper Bunch, Violet Striker, and Curtis Liljegren

4-session Prekindergarten: Ms. Janet’s class
February alphabet letters will be Oo, Pp for two weeks, and finishing up and heading into March with Qq. We will have themes to help us learn our addresses by sending mail to one another within our classroom, (watch for mail at home as well). We will have a Valentine’s Day Party on Monday, February 13th: please watch for the sign up sheet outside our classroom. Other themes for the month will be studying our two most famous February Presidents, money and Dental Health. We will have a PJ Day on Friday, February 24th and a Dr. Seuss Day on Friday March 2nd: More info will come home in student folders as these two special days get closer.

Upcoming Events
February
8 PDO III Program in the Music Room, 9:00 a.m.
Mom’s Night (3-day AM classes) at 6:30 p.m.

9 PDO III Program in the Music Room, 9:00 a.m.
Hearing and Speech Screening for Preschool/PDO III

13 Valentine Parties for Prekindergarten classes and PDO

14 Valentine Parties for Preschool classes and PDO

20 PECC is closed for President’s Day

22 Wings of Love Bird Show at 10:00 a.m. in the Big Room

23 3-day Prekindergarten Parent/Teacher Conferences
3-day PreK classes will not be in session.
PDO and 4-session Prekindergarten will be in session.

March
5 Happy Bear Presentation for Prekindergarten/PDO III classes

6 Happy Bear Presentation for Preschool/PDO III classes.

12-16 Spring Break; PECC is closed. Have a fun and safe week!