Sproutlings Newsletter: Week of February 22

Reminders and Upcoming Events:

• Upcoming New Providence Community Food Drive
  Saturday, March 13th in the Sproutlings’ parking lot
  Drop off times from 1:00 -3:00 pm
  This will be a drive-thru drop off, so please have items ready to hand to a volunteer through the window or be ready to open your trunk to a volunteer to collect the items. Masks required! The goal is to collect items to fill “pantry boxes” with everything from breakfast to baking, snacks to spices, along with basic household items for 20 families served by the NP CSA (Community Service Association). Sign up HERE.

  A reminder of the state sick policy regarding COVID 19:

• “Children who meet the following criteria should be excluded from the facility for at least 10 days from symptom onset, are fever free for 24 hours without fever reducing medication and symptoms have improved OR they have a negative COVID-19 test result which is submitted to the childcare center prior to their return.
  • At least two of the following symptoms: fever, chills, muscle aches, headache, sore throat, nausea or vomiting, diarrhea, fatigue, congestion or runny nose; OR
  • At least one of the following symptoms: cough, shortness of breath, difficulty breathing, new olfactory disorder, or new taste disorder.”

• While we understand that children will still get colds, we greatly appreciate parents keeping children with very runny noses home for a day to recover. This keeps both the teachers and other students in the class healthy and prevents colds from being passed around the room. If a runny nose is the only symptom, a negative Covid-test is not required to return. Thank you for your help with this!
• Please be sure you are following the most updated travel restrictions. https://covid19.nj.gov/faqs/nj-information/travel-and-transportation/are-there-travel-restrictions-to-or-from-new-jersey
• As always, please provide documentation whenever your child receives a vaccination. New Universal Health Records are due at your child’s annual physical each year. If you need a copy, please email Kerry at sproutlings.info@gmail.com

Peapods

What a great week in Peapods! We’ve been practicing our tummy time with friends. Some of us are able to reach and grasp our toys. Others are trying new foods for the first time. Our favorite song this week was, “Daisy, Daisy” The book of the week was Biscuit and the Pup by Alyssa Satin Capucilli. We can’t wait for the sunny days to come.

Peapod II

We’ve had so much fun in Peapod II this week! We met Mr. Frog, our bubble machine. He helps us get moving in the morning to some music. We like to sing and dance to all of our silly songs.

Some of us are learning to walk and some of us are learning how to use a spoon. We’ve played with dot markers and paint in a bag during art. In sensory, we got to play with some of the fresh snow that fell earlier this week. It was chilly! We’ve also had some big changes at nap time and everyone that is one has transitioned to a cot. We love our cots and sleep so well! Our new sign language signs this week are “please” and “thank you.” We’ve also been reading Highlight Hello and The Wheels on the Bus with Ms. Melissa.

Seedlings

We had a fun week in the Seedlings’ room!

We worked on our fine motor skills by peeling dot stickers and then putting them on animals.  We absolutely had a blast being able to peel those stickers.  We couldn’t get enough of it!  When in the indoor playground, we were able to work on our gross motor skills with the balls.  We are trying really hard to run and kick at the same time.  We also love being able to play catch with one another.  We’re still practicing our catching skills.

During Circle Time, we read Fox in Socks by Dr. Seuss and we sang “The Wheels on the Bus”.

Little Sprouts

What a busy week we had in Little Sprouts!  We had fun in our sensory bin ripping up tissue paper. We also texture painted on leprechauns beards with forks to get ready for March. With such nice weather this week, we sang about Mr. Sun and talked about how he is melting the snow.

Sunshine means shadows! Some of our friends discovered their shadows this week!  Lastly, we introduced a tunnel into our room, practicing taking turns and our patience. Can’t wait for next week!

Beanstalks

What an eventful week in Beanstalks! We started off the week by reviewing our arctic animals and diving deeper into what makes them so cool! We discovered that certain animals have blubber and other animals have fur. Part of our activity for the week was identifying which animals had blubber and which animals had fur. In addition, we also talked about what the word “camouflage” means. Everyone was interested to learn about this.

In addition to our arctic animals investigation, we also started to build our very own “Arctic Tundra Home” for some of our winter animals like the polar bears, snowy owls, penguins, and seals! During the rest of the week, we also worked on some of our fine motor skills and had fun doing it! We completed some winter animal worksheets that required stickers to put on them, while also practicing our tracing. Lastly, we made  St. Patrick’s Day rainbows for our craft of the week that we hung up in the room. They all look so beautiful! We can’t wait to see everyone next week and we hope everyone has a wonderful weekend.

Saplings

We had an exciting week in Saplings. We read a lot of Eric Carle books. Mister Seahorse, The Tiny Seed, The Very Busy Spider, and The House for Hermit Crab were some of our favorites! We also read Brown Bear, Brown Bear by Bill Martin and illustrated by Eric Carle.

We had fun drawing pictures of ourselves. The children loved painting a seahorse with water paints. We used our fine motor skills to put together a flower and string a spider web. The children enjoyed creating a house out of blocks for a hermit crab. We practiced writing letter “Tt.” We are looking forward to Read Across America week next week.

Pre K 4

Pre K 4 enjoyed learning all about dental health this week. We discussed the importance of keeping our teeth clean and the best ways to do so. We reviewed the difference between letters and numbers by sorting pictures of teeth with letters on them from pictures of teeth with numbers on them. Letters and sight words were practiced when the children used a tooth brush to erase them off a set of teeth. Math was incorporated when the children counted teeth and matched the correct number to the set of teeth. The children practiced healthy teeth patterns.

We used Handwriting Without Tears to practice the letters of the week which were “D” and “P.”  Some of the books we enjoyed this week were How to catch A Tooth Fairy,  Grandpa’s Teeth and The Teeth that Looked For A New Mouth.