It’s the last week of Geography, and we will be going to a Chinese restaurant this Friday. A post card will be going home with your child on Monday. The cost is $10.00.

One of our beloved parents commented to his child the other day while he was leaving for work,”Have fun!” Immediately, I thought, this place is not Disneyland or some street fair. This is school.

Of course I was delighted to think that parents think all the things we do are fun, the kids love it and they have a great time, but we are not an entertainment center. We’re a school.

Pajama Party today! Your child wears his pajamas to school! It’s a fun day on Friday!

There are so many differences among personality types these days…types who won’t give an inch. It makes the “find” in a kindred spirit really rewarding. Today I was talking to our beloved Miss Dayna. We discussed the differences in childhood ages, and how that works in the whole education package.

I maintain…it’s my theory…that three year olds NEED to be around older children, because threes need to see the next step. Most of a three year old’s time should be spent playing. Confining him to a desk for long periods, expecting what you expect from a four or five year old won’t happen…the desire and the ability in most instances just don’t exist. If you get blood from a turnip…you are probably really getting blood from a turnip!

Threes watch fours and fives. That’s their job. They won’t understand the concept of continents, oceans, and the globe…but the words, the ideas, the time spent seeing and hearing will all be there next year when the child becomes four, and his cognitive ability is different.

At four, a child is ready for most kindergarten work. This is the age when all that paperwork, all the pencils, and crayons, and the wonder of the desk is really calling. Most fours would be office persons…they love paper.

You can get a four year old to do just about any kindergarten task if you find the right opening and you stay with it. They will read, write and do arithmetic with relative ease. Some concepts are going to escape them simply because they are lacking one thing a five year old has…an abstract imagination.

So this is the time, at age four, when the mundane, boring, and relatively repetitive kindergarten work is easiest to teach. And there are other reasons to teach a four year old how to read and write…it gets the “how tos” out of the way so that when the abstract imagination begins to invade a five year old’s thinking, he won’t have to waste his time learning to read when it’s already done.

A five year old can understand abstract ideas, so he can do a lot of work based on what if…it’s a great time to introduce geography, science, and games. Fives are splendid beings with so much to offer…

So Miss Dayna and I were talking about the different ages, and agreeing about how each of them work off the other and how one group can do this, but another one can’t and it was splendid to be able to invent for them.

Miss Dayna works very hard in her classroom. She has all kinds of things she wants for her children to learn and to do. Understand what they can and can’t do helps, but like any fighter…she will try nearly anything anyway, just to see who can transcend the job even though…

I love having wonderful, hard working, talented teachers…makes my day.

What you need to know for this week:

This is the Southern Hemisphere week when we will study Africa, South America and Australia. Your child might be interested in the names of different countries on those continents.

On Friday, we will be having a pajama day. Children may wear their pjs, a robe, and their regular shoes so that they can go outside. It’s supposed to be warm on Friday.

Please make sure your child is covered.

There could be dreadful storms tomorrow. We will have a storm drill. Please feel free to call us at any time to check up on your child. It could be a nasty day.

We will try to eat a variety of meals this week that will delight your child. On Thursday, we will have an African meal. Parents are always welcomed to attend lunch. Please let us know by 10:30.

We are looking for a new degu. If you see one in a pet store, we would love to have it.

Please dress your child for the weather. It will be mild all week.

Have a great week!

You simply must get a bean pot! This is the new cookery item. I actually got mine when this cashier broke the one that I wanted. When he dropped it at the check out line, I went back to get the more expensive one, and he charged me the cheaper price, which I was thrilled about…long story now done.

My bean pot is an oven clay deal. It’s nondescript, and would make a nice planter, lamp, or catch-all. It’s a nice shade of muddy brown, with two handles on the side and a lid. Love the bean pot.

First recipe I tried in it was a bean recipe to absolutely die for. You take soaked and boiled beans with their water and you add seven strips of uncooked bacon, a cup of maple syrup, a 1/2 cup of ketchup, 1/4 cup of mustard, 1/4 cup of brown sugar, pepper, a teaspoon of ginger and a 1/2 teaspoon of all spice. Yum, and I don’t like baked beans.

Tonight’s little recipe is a stew in the bean pot. I browned 1.5 lbs of stew meat in a tablespoon of butter. I added potatoes, last night’s sweet carrots, and barbecue spices, garlic salt, ketchup, mustard, red wine, and then I added some of the beans from last night and a raw onion and went from the frying browning pan into the pot and then into the oven. Smells divine!

I will serve it with some of my homemade hamburger buns on some left over rice. Should be a delicious meal.

What I like most about the pot is that it cooks and conserves the liquid. That means a healthy alternative to grilling or frying.

Cooking for long periods is nice when you have the time. Makes the house smell good and it doesn’t have to be done at the last minute.

Buy a bean pot; you will be glad you did!

We had a great International Feast event on Friday. Lots of parents brought delicious food, and the kids seemed to really enjoy it.

We had Indian Curry, Chinese food, Gyogys which are Japanese, lots of egg rolls, pork fried rice, spicy chicken, Chicken Picatta – super good…Irish Soda Bread, Italian Spaghetti, Mexican foods of all kinds like quesadillas, enchiladas, a trifle to die for from a very evil mother who should never ever ever handle sugar of any kind!!! lol. We had Middle Eastern Falafel on pitas, Italian beef, and a lot more food that was incredible.

Kids were noisy on Friday. It must have been the excitement.

I was so pleased to have as many offerings as we had. It was truly a lovely afternoon, and we appreciate all the work and the love and commitment. Thank you so much for all you do!

Next on the agenda is the pajama party on Friday, January 27.

Every parent signs a “Sick Child” agreement when they enroll their child at the Garden School, and most other places that care about children. Most of the time, this agreement is not even read, and I know this because so many parents are surprised when we say a child cannot come to school.

We get our list of childhood ailments from the State Department of Health. And for each one of the ailments on the agreement, there is a reason why this particular ailment is not conducive to sending a child to school.
Here’s the list:

A fever of 99 degrees of higher
Vomiting within 24 hours
Diarrhea within 24 hours
Severe Constipation
Stomach ache
Headache
Earache
Ear infection
Profuse drainage from a cold
Any untreated infections
Hacking cough
Any flu
Strep throat
Tonsillitis
Pneumonia
Open wounds
Same day surgery
Teeth extractions
Tooth abscess
Head lice
Crabs
Chicken pox
Mumps
Measles
German Measles
Rubella
Fifth’s Disease
Roseola
Kawasaki’s Disease
Sleep Deprivation.

When a child comes to school with “a little fever” two things are happening: the child is incubating an illness that he or she is going to spread to many other children. Also, the child who is passing his virus, is very vulnerable to any other bug lurking on the surface of toys, drinking fountain, toilet etc. When children do not remain at home and quiet during a “little fever” the “little fever” often becomes a huge and dangerous bug.

It’s the same with vomiting, diarrhea, profuse drainage from a cold, any untreated infections, hacking cough, flu, strep throat, tonsillitis, pneumonia, head lice, crabs, chicken pox, mumps, measles, German measles, rubella, Fifth’s Disease, Roseola, Kawasaki’s Disease or any communicable childhood disease. These can be very dangerous to children, and bringing a child to school with one of these illnesses is a disgrace.

These are all spreadable, contagious illnesses which do not belong brought into a facility with children. Not only is it unfair, it’s against the law. It’s really a matter that must be reported to the health department who could turn over chronic abusers to Child Welfare.

As for severe constipation, stomach ache, headache, earache, and ear infections…really? Parents would actually bring children to school to “play” knowing that their child was in terrible pain? Really? The answer is yes.

And how do we get by with this? We baby pack and shove the kid through the door hoping that the over the counter medication we packed into a child will hold just long enough to make it through the morning…then when the call comes from school, we can postpone picking the child up till snack…Sound awful? It is criminal.

One of the things that is on the list that few parents are concerned with is sleep deprivation. Children need ten to twelve hours of sleep every day. When they are “kept up late” children suffer. Children who are chronically sleep deprived behave as if they are mentally disabled. They can’t learn like other children; they can’t eat like other children because they are just too tired; they can’t run and jump like other kids. They mule around looking for a bed all day and miss most of what the other children are learning.

The guideline for whether a child should come to school is easy: if a child needs over the counter medication, he or she is not feeling well enough to go to school. Check the list. What exactly is the child suffering from? What can you do to keep your child safe, and his friends safe at school. One day? It’s better than five.
For the most part, a child who is kept home on the first day that he or she is ill, that child will probably only be sick one day. Most kids can fight off illnesses easily.

We’ve had an easy winter so far this year, but several nasty bugs have been passed around already. With the see/saw weather we are experiencing, we are waiting for the next round. Please watch your child carefully in the morning. Not a bad idea to “cheek to cheek” during your morning routine. Placing your cheek to your child’s will tell you instantly if your child is running a fever. His cheek on your cheek will be hot.

Wishing you the best this cold and flu season…

One of the things that makes my day is walking into three separate classrooms and finding real learning going on. We focus on the five year olds more than the other ages because the fives are giving back what they learned. The fours are learning to learn from the fives and the threes are putting together a learning plan while they do most of the watching. It’s a remarkable group effort and never ceases to amaze me how demonstrative five year old children are and how much the others learn from them!

So this week we will look at another part of the world…the Northern Hemisphere with an emphasis on the Temperate Zone. I have to remember that our focus is on the five year olds. Threes are there to observe learning. The fours are learning to learn and the fives are learning and telling us what they’ve learned. This allows the Threes the freedom to explore but not the obligation of things too hard for them. The fours are filled with curiosity and participate nicely, but they are often not there, and that’s OK. Their time will come.