Category Archives: Families and Community

Welcome to Spring 2015 in Room 1

Posted on January 16, 2015 by Laura Paciorek| Comments Off on Welcome to Spring 2015 in Room 1

Dear Families:

 

We are excited to begin a new semester with all of you.  We cannot wait to see how the children have grown over break.  We are also excited to welcome a few new children and families to our classroom.  It is going to be such a fun semester.  We have a few updates for you as we begin:

 

NEW TEACHERS AND SCHEDULES: We have a new face in our room and some of the teachers’ schedules are changing a little bit this semester.  If you see someone new, be sure to say “hello.”  We have been spending a lot of time working together as a team during the past two weeks and getting to know one another.  The Room 1 team is a fantastic group, I think!

 

  • Ms. Amanda – Ms. Amanda’s schedule is changing to Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays this semester.  We are glad to have her in our room!
  • Ms. Caroline – Ms. Caroline is going to be teaching on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays.  However, you will also see her in a new role on Mondays and Wednesdays when she will be completing her student teaching through the internship class.
  • Ms. Chandler – Ms. Chandler will be working full days now on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.  We are glad that she will be staying with us until the end of the day.
  • Ms. Ruby – Ms. Ruby is a new teacher on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays.  She did service learning in Room 3 last semester.  We are excited to have her in Room 1.
  • Ms. Ana – Ms. Ana will be a floater in our classroom, primarily on Mondays and Wednesdays.  You may also see her around on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
  • Ms. Laura – I will still be here Monday through Friday.  There are a few days here and there where I will be absent.  In many of those cases, Ms. Nicole will be subbing.

 

If you have any questions about our staff, please let me know.  Also, you can see some bios of the teachers in our classroom if you would like to get to know them a bit more!

 

CUBBIES: Please insure that your cubbies are stocked with a change of clothes and diapers for your child. We will be getting right into art, water in the sensory table, and more!

 

NEW ROUTINE: We have a new routine for our classroom!  We hope that you find the changes to be exciting.  The biggest change is that we will be starting our day outdoors and finishing our day indoors.  When you come in the morning, be sure to sign in in our sign in book, help your child wash his or her hands, and then bring your child to the yard.  We plan to have a teacher indoors each day to greet you, too!

 

PLANNING DOCUMENTS: We also have our first week’s plans to share with you.  On the second page of the document, you can see what we will be doing for large groups and for special activities.  During the first week we will not go to the art studio, as the teachers and children will be getting used to our new routine.  However, we have some fun 3D artwork planned for inside our classroom.  We also plan to read Brown Bear, Brown Bear and sign “The Bear Went Over the Mountain” with some sign language incorporated into it.  The classroom is set up slightly differently this semester, too.  We are hoping that the changes will lead to more use of some of the areas of our classroom

 

WINTER BREAK JOURNAL: If you have completed your winter break journal, we would enjoy seeing it!  If you are a new family, please do not worry about completing a journal.  Instead, we would love to have a few family pages created for the journal books that are left here at school.  We cannot wait to add more pages to your child’s journal this semester.
FACEBOOK: Please consider visiting our CDC Facebook page for information and updates about the Center as a whole!

 

Have a great weekend everyone.  We cannot wait to see you all on Tuesday, January 20 (or Wednesday, if you do not attend on Tuesday).  Also, if there’s anyone to add to our classroom email list, please let me know.  I am using a completely new list now since there are now new families in our room!

 

-Laura Paciorek

 

New routine: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1x1T7NIfw0NcwjiXF1ztyq6eF7BOpfUBqYE8CmM-KaWc/edit?usp=sharing

First week’s plans: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Hqobw_LZJzEzr4f5eOVBIRSnOLemzr1m-BN-nO8JKUc/edit?usp=sharing

CDC Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Child-Development-Center-at-MiraCosta-College/213823248677493

 

BCC: Families of Room 1, Teachers of Room 1, Supervising Staff of the CDC

Posted in Classroom Posts, Families and Community, Planning Documents

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Winter Break Journal

Posted on December 3, 2014 by Laura Paciorek| Comments Off on Winter Break Journal

This winter break, we are sending home a winter break journal for the children and families to complete.  It has recipes in it and special activity pages that can be brought back to school, shared, and put in the child’s journal book.  Here is the winter break journal we are sending home:

Winter Break Journal

Posted in Classroom Posts, Families and Community

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Room 1 Updates: Shutterfly, Room Parties, Lines Project, New Plans, Birdseed!

Posted on November 14, 2014 by Laura Paciorek| Comments Off on Room 1 Updates: Shutterfly, Room Parties, Lines Project, New Plans, Birdseed!

Dear Families:

We hope that you had a great week and that you enjoy the weekend.

SHUTTERFLY: Shutterfly has been updated!  There are some new photos for you here: https://room1mcccdc.shutterfly.com/

CHEESE PIZZA/FRUIT SALAD ROOM PARTIES: Our room would like to have room parties during the week of Thanksgiving.  We are open Monday through Wednesday that week (closed Thursday and Friday, 11/27-11/28).  Here are the details about the parties:

Time: 11:00 – 11:30 a.m.

Dates: Tuesday, 11/25, and Wednesday, 11/26

Where: Room 1

What: Pizza and fruit salad parties

Please look for a donation list near the sign in book for the room parties!  We think that it will make our week fun to have little gatherings before the long weekend.

ROOM UPDATES: We have a new planning sheet to share with all of you here: https://wordpress.miracosta.edu/laurap/files/2014/11/Indoor-planning-November-17.pdf

LINES PROJECT: Our classroom has begun a project about lines.  We made an anticipatory web, which is in the hallway with our new documentation.  The art studio has been great.  The lines children have been making with crayons and watercolors are so neat to see.  We decided at our room planning meeting today that our next step would be to focus on the “lines and our bodies” section of the web.  The children in Room 1 have shown an interest in their bodies during songs and routine parts of the day.  We want to start this part of the investigation by tracing the children’s hands and then inviting them to look at all of the lines on their hands.  We can’t wait to see what they discover!

BIRDSEED DONATIONS: The birds have found our bird feeder outside!  We are in need of birdseed.  Some large hardware and general retail stores sell birdseed in large bags.  Pet stores are often more expensive, but we will take any birdseed!

​

– The Teachers of Room 1 –

BCC: Families of Room 1, Teachers of Room 1, Supervising Staff of the CDC

Posted in Classroom Posts, Families and Community, Nature, Planning Documents, Project Work

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First long-term project, art studio, and school closed Tuesday

Posted on November 5, 2014 by Laura Paciorek| Comments Off on First long-term project, art studio, and school closed Tuesday
Dear Families:
We are very excited in Room 1 because we have started our first in-depth project where the children will be encouraged to study lines in artwork (and maybe beyond) and the tools that can be used to make lines.  This project was inspired by some of the observations teachers have been making in the classroom.  We will be hanging up the beginning of a documentation about this project in the hallway soon.  We can’t wait for you to see it!  You might get ideas for how to extend the learning into your own home, too.
To support the project, we are starting to take children to the art studio.  This is just down the hall by the adult bathrooms.  In the art studio, children will be working with art materials, the teachers, and children in Room 2.  Our time to go to the art studio is at 8:30 a.m.  Our drop-off period is from 8:15 a.m. – 8:30 a.m.  We will attempt to take all children to the art studio, rotating who gets to explore lines, but children who are consistently late to school (arriving after 8:30 a.m.) may miss out on this opportunity.  We have the first time slot of the day for the art studio so that the other classrooms can also use it during the morning program.
We also wanted to send out a quick reminder that school (and entire campus) will be closed on Tuesday, November 11.
 
We hope that you have a great day.  It has been so warm out and tomorrow is supposed to be even warmer (they say)!  Now is the time of year for layers, for sure!
See you all soon.
-The Teachers of Room 1-

Posted in Classroom Posts, Families and Community, Project Work, Visual Arts

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Room 1 Updates – Journals and Environment

Posted on November 3, 2014 by Laura Paciorek| Comments Off on Room 1 Updates – Journals and Environment
Dear Families of Room 1:
We are happy to announce that there are new pages in your child’s journal book at school!  We keep the journal books in the back room and look at them regularly.  The new photos are so much fun!
We also have some environment changes that will be happening in the classroom:
  • ​Manipulatives: We are putting out new puzzles, a color and shape sorting activity, nesting cups, and small building blocks that have all kinds of neat things in them (like mirrors, a kaleidoscope, and more).
  • Dramatic play: We made our kitchen area into a little cafe.  We have been reading Growing Vegetable Soup by Lois Ehlert, so we decided to put out vegetables, a large pot, and soup bowls.
  • Science: We added a balance and will continue to explore the fish and our growing seeds with magnifying glasses.
  • Light table: We would like to put feathers on the light table.  We were talking about how it would be nice to put different kinds of leaves on the sensory table.  If any of you are out for a walk and see nice fallen leaves, we will gladly take donations!
  • Blocks: We are going to move the unit blocks so they are more visible by the children and might be used more.
  • Art: We are planning to find a short easel for the area and add more collage items to the area.  We are talking about small pieces of paper and colored glue.
  • Sensory table: Since the children liked exploring the large dome of ice, we are planning to put different shapes of ice in the sensory table and explore them in different ways.
We have been singing “Five Little Monkeys” with a five monkey flannel board set.  This has been going well and we will likely continue that.  We have also started to dance to “Animal Action!”
We are also planning to make play dough to go with our new dough scissors.
Thank you for reading our updates.  We hope that you enjoy hearing about what is happening in Room 1.  It’s a fun place.
-The Teachers of Room 1-

Posted in Classroom Posts, Families and Community, Planning Documents