3’s am did marching, instruments, book with music, puppet with music and pretend food, and some signing too.
Music with Kelly 🎵🎶🎼
3’s am did marching, instruments, book with music, puppet with music and pretend food, and some signing too.
We are all jazzed to be back to school! Â The teachers, students and families are settling into their routines and getting to know each other.Â
We would like to thank Mrs. Pamela Cartee for her four years of wonderful teaching service to our 3s program.  She has touched so many young lives and been a memorable, patient and nurturing member of our community as a co-op parent, co-op President and teacher.  We will miss her and wish her and her family all the best! Â
And in other exciting co-op news, we would like to welcome Mrs. Tara Johnson  as our new 3s teacher.  We are thrilled to have Mrs. Johnson “back” since she has been a member of our community since 2011 as a co-op parent and co-op President previously.  Her heart has always been here, now we are happy to have her as a teacher.
Lastly, there are a few openings in the PM classes. Email or call Membership for enrollment information at membership.cns@gmail.com or 443-292-6625.Â
Here’s to a fantastic 2018-2019 school year!
Summertime is in full effect! Â Please keep an eye on our facebook page for upcoming events for CNS!! Â We will be getting outside to nearby parks throughout the summer to get the kiddos together and enjoy the sunshine! Â We will also be attending a few of the Crofton Farmers Markets throughout the summer. Â Please feel free to join us!
HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY! There is nothing more uplifting than celebrating holidays with kids and when the holiday is Valentine’s Day, a day filled with sweets and treats and sharing our love with our friends and family, it really doesn’t get much better! Today, at CNS we had a fun filled day with music, laughter, crafts and exchanging valentines, it was a blast!
Miss Kelly came for a special Valentine’s Day music class filled with lots of learning and lots of fun! Miss Kelly’s music classes help to support our curriculum and reinforce what we are working on in the classroom … the pledge of allegiance, shapes, letters, sight-words, left/right, etc. It is a wonderful and FUN way to help encourage the love of learning at a young age!
Miss Kelly helped the kids dance and sing along to special Valentine’s Day songs and as always she helped get those extra wiggles and giggles out of the kids 🙂
Together we made “love bugs” and even though the kids might not know it, they worked on math while doing this craft. We discussed how to compare and order things based on size. Our “love bugs” went from biggest to smallest and we discussed the different ways to describe the same things with different words, for example “tallest to shortest” or “biggest to smallest” etc. My favorite part of this activity was seeing the creativity in each child’s very own “love bug”.
We exchanged valentines with our classmates and shared a very special Valentine’s Day treat. Thank you again to all of our wonderful working parents who always take the extra step to make these days even more special for the kids!
With the cold weather blowing through us here in Maryland, we all need our hats, gloves and mittens more than ever. Today at CNS, we made our very own mittens to celebrate the wonders of wintertime!
The students worked on writing their names on the back of their mittens and then they got to let their creativity run wild decorating them.
Glue, buttons, gems, feathers and more! Each mitten was as unique as the child making them! It is wonderful watching their young minds coming up with new creations!
The weather has been getting colder and colder and for most of us that means bundling up and trying to stay warm but for a Minnesota girl like Mrs. Scott-Kem it means fun with science! There are not many people who can get a group of 4 and 5 year olds together to make a scientific hypothesis, test their hypothesis and track the results, Mrs. Scott-Kem however, is one of those people and we are very lucky to have her here at CNS!
Mrs. Scott-Kem discussed the difference between a solid and a liquid and how some of the things we see everyday are different forms of the same exact thing, like water. To help better understand this, the class did a fun science experiment.
We filled 2 containers with water, one had a lid and could hold more water and the other was a shallow bowl without a lid. We placed both containers outside on a very, very cold January morning. But which container would freeze first? … and so the fun begins! Together the class came up with their own hypotheses about which container would freeze and we tracked each student’s prediction on our magnet board.
While the kids were waiting for the water to freeze, we discussed the reasons why they felt one container would freeze before the other. We discussed how the volume of the liquid, (which one has more or less than the other) as well as having a lid might affect the results. This might sound like a lot for 4 year olds to comprehend, but they didn’t skip a beat! At the end of class we brought the containers inside and discussed the results. Since the blue bowl was shallow (held less water) and had no lid, it was the first to freeze. As you can see from our hypotheses, most of the kids were spot on! And the ones who predicted the other container proved that even at 4 and 5 years old, they can make their own choices and not just follow the crowd. It was really fun watching their big brains at work! Yay for STEM at CNS!
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.
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!
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.
 
 
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!!
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.
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!)
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 right, letters 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.
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.
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!
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!
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.
 
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!
