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The 4s Celebrate the Holidays!

On Wednesday December 20th the 4s classes put on their holiday finest and performed for their parents. After months of practicing they performed numerous songs including, “I’m a Little Pinetree,” “Hear the Bells,” “Jingle Bells,” and the grand finale of “Here Comes Santa!” The students had worked very hard and the smiles on their faces showed how very proud they were to finally prove their practicing had paid off! The songs came complete with hand motions and well timed bell ringing, and the restraint it took them to ring the bells only when they were supposed to was palpable.

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Hand Motions

After their performance, students and parents worked together to create a beautiful Christmas Tree craft that families will treasure for years to come. Seeing as this is our second kiddo to go through CNS, we now have two of these and we just love them!

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The students then listened intently as Mrs. Scott-Kem read The Reindeer Christmas by Moe Price. This is a book with beautiful pictures about how all different animals auditioned to pull Santa’s sleigh, and in the end it was the reindeer who were chosen.

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Lastly, students and parents enjoyed a pot-luck style holiday lunch and copious amounts of homemade treats. Everyone left with full bellies and wide smiles.

Happy Holidays from the Crofton  Nursery School Family to yours!!

 

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Frosty’s Table – Christmas Shopping at CNS

We have all heard it a thousand times that the best part of Christmas is not the gifts we receive but seeing the joy our gifts bring to the ones we love. I for one didn’t truly understand this concept until I became a parent and now I can’t imagine a greater gift than seeing the happiness and joy that a carefully selected and personal gift can provide to those I love. Most kids don’t get the chance to experience this, they look forward to the gifts they will receive on Christmas but since they can’t buy gifts themselves they miss out on the joy of gift giving.

Here at CNS we have a very special Christmas tradition called “Frosty’s Table”.  A few weeks before Christmas each family sends in gifts that are around $5 each for individual members of their family and sends in a list of family members they will shop for (ex: Mom, Dad, brother – 6 years old and 2 dogs). These gifts aren’t shown to the kids so they don’t know what their family provided. The kids get to go “shopping” at school and select gifts for their family, then they get to help wrap the presents and bring them home to put under their tree. This is one of my absolute favorite things we do here at CNS and I both my kids loved giving their very own presents last year and I can’t wait to see what they come up with this year!

 

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Learning Through Music

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Music is very important to the developing brain and there are countless studies showing how listening to music can help work different parts of the brain. Here at CNS, we understand and encourage the incorporation of music into many of our lessons and new this year, we have added a music class to our curriculum. Our music teacher Miss Kelly comes to each of our classes once a month (that’s 4 separate music classes each month!)

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Miss Kelly works with our teachers to incorporate what we are working on in the classroom into her music class. This month we worked on left and rightletters and letter sounds, colors and shapes and so much more. You’d be amazed how much she can teach them in just one class! And the best part is the kids are having so much fun, they don’t even realize they are learning with each and every song.

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Music with Miss Kelly is also about what is going on each month. We had a lot of fun counting with leaves and even dancing like a turkey to get ready for Thanksgiving.

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Since we were learning about fire safety and getting ready for a special field trip to the Crofton Fire Station, Miss Kelly did fire safety songs. She reinforced the importance of fire safety and how to stop, drop & roll all through music. I for one didn’t know songs like these existed!

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Happy Halloween

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Who doesn’t love Halloween?! Here at CNS we love to share in all the fun this time of year has to offer. Each of our classes having been practicing Halloween songs and poems for their special Halloween performance for all the parents and it was wonderful!

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Watching the classes sing and dance showed just how hard the classes worked to prepare for this event. I for one, thought it was absolutely wonderful! This is just another example of how a co-op is not just for the kids in the school but also for the parents and family to share in all of our school events.

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HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

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5 Little Pumpkins

The students have been learning the poem “Five Little Pumpkins” for the Halloween celebration here at CNS and in the art room they were able to do a special project to go along with it.  The pumpkin page was so much fun that the kids didn’t even realize how much they were learning.

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Each child had to sort their pumpkins by size, littlest to biggest. Once they completed that they had to match the coordinating number to the pumpkin.

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For an added challenge they had to match the word version of each number to the coordinating pumpkin. They had no idea they were working on math and sight words as well as making a cool project.

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Lastly, each student was able to use their creativity to make faces for each of their pumpkins. It really gave the project a personal touch!

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Fall Festivities

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Even though the weather has been all of the place this Fall, here at CNS we are enjoying all the fun Fall has to offer. What kid doesn’t love a messy Halloween inspired experiment?! When it’s washable paint, even the parents love it!  The students created their very own jack-o-laterns but first they had to make the correct color to paint with. We had a blast mixing our yellow and red paint to create the perfect pumpkin orange. It was fun to see the kids putting on their thinking caps and problem solving to see which color they needed to add more of to make the paint the perfect pumpkin orange. Each jack-o-latern was unique and fun just like the child who made them.

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“Me Box” – Getting to Know New Friends

Here at CNS we want everyone to feel right at home and feel comfortable to be themselves. One of my favorite projects here at CNS helps to get the ball rolling to help the students get to know each other and their teachers right away. In the 4’s classes its called the “Me Box” and in the 3’s classes it is called “Me Bags”. The teachers start things off by bringing in special and unique items that help the class learn all about who they are and all the things that are important to them. Mrs. Scott-Kem (our 4’s teacher) always blows the kids away when they learn that she is a boxer and a rower and especially when she shows them her big strong muscles! It’s a great way to remind the kids that teachers have lives outside of school just like they do. As a parent it also helps us to learn more about the teachers on a personal level since we work so closely with them throughout the year.

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Each students gets their own turn to decorate and fill their “Me Box” and present it to the class. Not only is this a wonderful ice-breaker for classmates but it is a really great way to bond with your child at home while filling their box to help show their class what makes them so incredibly unique and awesome!

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Each student gets to present their “Me Box” to the class and talk about the things they brought in. Not only does this help the class learn about what makes them, them but it also helps to build their confidence to ask questions and to share in front of the class.

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End-of-Summer Water Bash

Summer is coming to an end so we decided to celebrate the sunshine and school starting soon with a Water Bash!

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We busted out the sprinklers, water tables, bubbles, sidewalk chalk and all things fun for the outdoors and let the kiddos go to town on the blacktop and playground. I think it was a great ice breaker for new families to meet each other and our children to get to know their classmates in a fun and laid back environment. And plus, there was pizza and cookies so.. lots of smiling faces!

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Part of me can’t believe Summer is already over and that we’re preparing to open our classroom doors next week for Class Orientations.

We’ll miss you Summer but we are so excited to have laughter, learning and smiling faces filling our classrooms again.

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School’s out for Summer

Summer break is officially here and our school is almost unrecognizable with everything stored and covered.

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We sure will miss the laughter and learning in this happy space and can’t wait for a new group of eager children to join us in the Fall!

Enjoy your Summer breaks!

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Congratulations to our newest Graduates!

Our wonderful 4-year-olds graduated from preschool and are ready to take the next big step towards Kindergarten!

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We are so proud of how much they have accomplished and grown this year.

During the ceremony they sang some of their favorite songs from all the different seasons and recited some poems.

The parents put together a special slide show complete with baby pictures that had the kids giggling and guessing who it was. It was adorable!

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Thank you to all of our families who came to celebrate! We can’t wait to watch your children blossom in our community for years to come.

Don’t forget to come back and visit us!

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