Welcome to the New Year!
But before we jump into 2010, let’s take a look back at 2009….The children put on a joyous performance for the Holiday Show in December and everybody enjoyed cookies and fruit afterwards. Some of you commented that you preferred having the show in the day care space versus the upstairs Meeting House room. We will keep that in mind for next year. It was great to see many of you before the holidays and we look forward to seeing you at the Potluck Dinner at the day care tonight. We will announce a number of fun events that have been added to the calendar for the rest of the school year. So, be sure to stop on by tonight.
Holiday Show DVD's for Sale
Matt Potter, Juliet and Scarlet’s dad, videotaped the Holiday Show and offered to make DVD’s for everybody who might be interested. If you would like to purchase a DVD for $10 please let me know. Thanks, Matt!
Looking for parent references
When I give tours to prospective parents, I always provide them with a list of current parents they can contact if they want to hear about our program from the perspective of current families. Most parents appreciate this extra piece of information. In the end, however, only a small percentage of prospective parents actually do call parents on the list. So, you don’t need to worry about getting phone calls every day. If you are interested in becoming a parent reference, please provide me with your phone number and best times for prospective families to call. Thank you very much for your help!
Free Admission
Jeannette Winter, Gannon's mom, brought this special event to my attention. Thanks for sharing!!!
Eight cultural institutions in the Brandywine Valley are waiving admission fees on Saturday, Jan. 23.
Waiving admission fees on Jan. 23 will be the eight members of the Brandywine Museums and Gardens Alliance. The "free day" was offered for the first time in 2009, and the results were overwhelmingly positive.
The attractions that will be admission-free are the:
Brandywine River Museum, internationally known for its unparalleled collection of art by three generations of Wyeths;
Delaware Art Museum, with a world-renowned collection of American art and illustration, and British Pre-Raphaelite art;
Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts, one of the nation's leading contemporary visual arts organizations;
Delaware Historical Society, including the Delaware History Museum and the Read House and Gardens;
Delaware Museum of Natural History, with an African watering hole, dinosaur skeletons, and an interactive Discovery Room;
Hagley Museum and Library, a 235-acre site along the Brandywine River that houses the remains of the original DuPont gunpowder mills and family residence;
Rockwood Museum, an English country estate that features unique gardens and a Rural Gothic mansion; and
Winterthur Museum and Country Estate, the ancestral home of renowned antiques collector Henry Francis du Pont, where the 175-room mansion set amongst 1,000 acres houses the preeminent collection of American antiques and decorative arts.
What does your child learn at Oak Lane?
It's a question to which there are an endless number of answers. But we will try to provide you with an insight and some answers as to what goes on in the classrooms during the day and what children are learning in the next few editions of this newsletter. Many of you chose Oak Lane because we use the Creative Curriculum, a play-based curriculum, that teaches children important social and emotional skills, large and fine motor skills, and cognitive skills, including language. The foundation for our approach is that active and engaged children learn more and most importantly remember more. That kind of learning is very different from teaching a child the ABC's by using flashcards, which only leads to rote memorization. If not practiced over and over again, that knowledge is quickly lost versus actual learning by doing something, which manifests itself in the brain much better. We will go on a journey through your child's day and discover how the various different activities in the course of a day are valuable learning experiences for your child.
The February Newsletter will highlight the importance of social and emotional skills. They are the first step in raising children to be curious learners. If you have a question about this or another subject, please send me an e-mail and I will answer it in the next newsletter.
