Toddle Towne

Beginners:  We are all revved up about transportation this month.  Children love the sound, the speed, and the excitement of pretending to be a driver.   We will put this excitement to good use!  Pictures of cars, trucks, trains, planes, and boats decorating the wall will be used to start conversations and learn new words, boats will float in the water table, and cars will be pushed through shaving cream “snow”,  children will count cars and sort them by color, and will put their toys “in” and “out” of a truck.  A “share your bike” day will help them learn important social skills.

December 28 – 31 – “Row, Row, Row your Boat” is fun to sing, but even more fun when you share it with a friend by locking arms and swaying back and forth in rhythm to the music!

January 4 – 8 – Making a Pedestrian Print by painting the sole of your shoe in a bright color is so much fun!  Then we press the shoe onto paper to make a colorful print and after washing the paint off the shoe sole we can sort the shoes into pairs, practice putting them on, and match each shoe sole to its colored print.

January 11 – 15 –  A parachute can save your life if you have to jump out of an airplane, but they are also lots of fun and good exercise.  The children all grab an edge and move it up and down, it’s even more fun when you get to run under the puffed up parachute or put balls on the parachute and bounce them up and down like popcorn.

January 18 – 22 – Picture displays make our rook bright and pretty, but more importantly, we can use them to pick out big cars and little cars, put things in and out of the trucks, and count the balls loaded into the bed of each truck picture.

January 25 – 29 – What a beautiful design we will create when we run wheeled toys through bright colored paint and then across our papers.  We will look for secondary colors made by mixing  by mixing two primary colors and find patterns in our tire tracks

We are all revved up about transportation this month.  Children love the sound, the speed, and the excitement of pretending to be a driver.  Our Pretend Play area will become a Car and Bike Fix-it Shop where children can wash and repair bikes, trikes, and scooters.  We will build roads with blocks to use with our cars, trucks, and traffic signs, and count and compare the number of blocks that can be loaded into two trucks. We will learn to classify as we sort pictures into categories of land, air, and water transportation and read numbers from license plates.

December 28 – 31 – After reading “The Little Engine that Could” and discussing what we would each like to accomplish, children will create a page using the repetitive phrase “I think I can. . . “ and adding a personal goal and illustration.  Stop and enjoy this class made book with your child.

January 4 – 8 – Discovering what will sink and float is a deliciously tasty learning experience when you test raisins, nuts, marshmallows, and fruit by dropping them into blue gelatin — which you can eat for a snack.

January 11 – 15 – We are taking a field trip . . . to the parking lot!  We will look at two different cars and fill out items on a chart about each one of them.  Then we will list the ways they are alike and different.

January 18 – 22 – Martin Luther King thought all people should be treated equally.  We will explore the meaning of the word equal as we compare stacks of blocks and find ones that are equal and not equal.

January 25 – 29 – We are comparing and contrasting all the vehicles we studied this month to determine how they are alike and how they differ.

Even our oldest children are captivated by the idea of special vehicles for special purposes.  We will use this theme to create more playful ways to extend their school day learning.    Children will learn to use strategies and logic as they play Battleship, improve spatial concepts by mapping the center and using the maps to give directions, and experimenting with modifications to paper airplanes, and measuring and comparing the distances they will fly.

December 28 – 31 – After a discussion on the tradition of making changes at the beginning of the year, we will make a list of personal and class Resolutions to starting the New Year.  We will post the list in the classroom so we can read and review it frequently.

January 4 – 8 – We will make a cheerful room decoration using colorful paper to make a train with 26 cars.  Each car will be labeled with a letter of the alphabet.  Throughout the week we will write words on the train cars that begin with the alphabet label and load the train car with pictures of things that start with that letter of the alphabet.

January 11 – 15 – We will blast off to outer space.  Each student will make a Moon Monster, and then we will sort them by their distinctive characteristics (1 eye, green skin, or 3 arms).  We will create Moon Rocks with a mixture of plaster of Paris, glitter, and other interesting things

January 18 – 22 – How fast will a parachute drop?  Children will use string, weights, and fabric scraps to make a parachute.  After enjoying the fun of dropping it from the top of a step ladder they will use a stopwatch to time the drop and experiment with changing the size of the cloth, length of the string, height of drop, and the attached weight to see what will make it go fastest.

January 25 – 29 – We expect lots of giggles as we play I went to Arkansas (in an automobile eating an artichoke, wearing alligator skin shoes).  This is a classic but still a lot of fun (and phonics practice).  The first child starts with the letter A naming a place they would like to go.  The second child repeats the destination and adds a mode of travel starting with the same letter of the alphabet, the third repeats both and adds a food, the fourth repeats it all and adds an article of clothing, and then they start on the second letter of the alphabet.

Each classroom will be staffed with two qualified staff member, one working the early shift and one working the late shift which would have two qualified staff members available for each room during the majority of the day and ensure that we have extra staff available to cover all of the new arrival and departure rules, vacations and absences.

The maximum group sizes are half to one-quarter of what they were before with twice as much staff so there will be plenty of time and staff available to ensure we are adhering to the strictest sanitation protocols and that we can spread out to keep a safe distance between the children.

Parents can take comfort knowing TTLC has always made sanitation a top priority in accordance with DCFS standards, but we have stepped up our efforts to meet the challenge of COVID 19. Every classroom will be sanitized thoroughly prior to opening every day and at least once each morning, during naptime, again each afternoon, and once more prior to closing each day. Playground equipment will be thoroughly sanitized after every use. 

Surfaces such as doorknobs, light switches, countertops toys, phones, keyboards, computer mouse, and other items identified as frequently handled will be thoroughly sanitized repeatedly throughout the day. Whenever possible sanitizing will be done when the children are not present.

In all of the planning and preparation required to meet the new State requirements, our directors and teachers kept our standard of “Kids learning while they play, and playing while they learn” as a top priority. This is an unsettled time for young children and we’ve made it our goal to ease that stress as much as possible.

Working closely with our state representatives, we are re-establishing routines where possible while staying flexible to meet ever-changing requirements as they are released. Your patience and cooperation are greatly appreciated as adjustments are made. Working together we will keep our children safe and happy.