Meadowlark's New Home

 It's official! Meadowlark now calls the building at the corner of Mansfield and Fairview "home"!

After months of renovating and preparing the school, last week we opened the doors to our new space.

As the children become accustomed to our new environment, we have tried to keep as much consistency across the program as possible. The children are playing and getting acquainted with the toys . . .

Children at Play with Miss Allyson

. . . and taking in the new view.

Parent Meeting in the School-age Room

We look forward to getting everyone back into the rhythm of things in our new school before we break for the holidays. 

Meadowlark Open House

On Saturday, December 1st, we held an Open House in our new facility! Joined by enrolled families, past and present, as well as community members, we welcomed all into our new school space.

 

Every room was set up using the same Waldorf principles that we follow in our current school rooms.

Many choices are made to create a more homelike atmosphere: 

• The furniture and toys are predominately wood rather than a more institutional plastic.
• Art hangs on the wall. Just as we decorate our homes to be aesthetically pleasing, we have decorated the school with art to create a beautiful environment for the children.

The Entryway

 

 

Our entryway is more than a place to hang your hat. It also serves as a transitional space in which children can ease into the activity of the classroom and spend a few extra quiet minutes with their parents if they choose.

The Art Studio

A room dedicated to the development of the children's creative expression. It is our intention that the art studio be used as a resource room of sorts in which the children will find materials (e.g., scissors, paint, chalk etc.) to express their ideas and enrich their play. 

The School Room

 

The main school space is organized in play areas such as reading, building, pretend play, and a manipulative area. The children have the freedom to choose activities that are of interest to them.

We have also expanded our program by adding an after-school room and infant room (pictures to come).

Thanks to all who stopped by to check out our new space. We are looking forward to officially moving in and will keep you posted when we finally do.

Catching Up

Its been a long while since our blog has been updated. So long that I gasped when I realized that the last entry was from nearly 10 months ago. So much has happened over that time that I will only attempt an mini update and instead apologize profusely for lack of attention to this blog. I'm going to just dive right in here, so fasten your belts!

February 2012 ended and we sprung right into spring with lots of water color painting, egg dying, seed planting, and of course the annual school picnic.

 

We also expanded our family and welcomed baby boy number 3!

 

The end of the 2011-2012 school year was celebrated with our very first Meadowlark Preschool graduation ceremony. We were so happy to congratulate our three graduates and wished them well in their transition into Kindergarten.

Summer arrived and we enjoyed our long sunny days at school, camp style. There were trips to the Cerra Vista Park, water play under the whale and sprinklers, and special sports classes each day with our summer helper Ms. Allyson. But the biggest event of the summer was signing the lease on what would be our very own school building!

This fall we welcomed so many new families and a wonderful group of new students. As our school continues to grow, the wonderful aspects of our program components remain the same.

Creative and imaginative play.

Friendship and learning through interactions with others.

 Age appropriate curriculum, hands on learning, and respecting the natural wonder of childhood.

 

As a parent I love staying informed on the happenings in my child's life. As an educator I love sharing moments with others and looking back over things I've done. My hope is that this blog fills both of those passions not only for myself but for others that join in on the journey.

A wonderful and talented parent has offered her help in keeping this space current and filled with beautiful pictures and words. I am forever grateful for the help and excited to see this blog continue during, what undoubtedly will be, an amazing school year full of new opportunity and exciting change.

Love

The first 14 days of February were all about love. Here are some of the love and heart inspired projects we did.

Potato Print

We cut potatoes into heart shapes and then had the children stamp with red, pink, and purple tempera paint.

3-D Hanging Hearts

After the students decorated construction paper hearts with tissue paper scraps, we glued 3 of the heart together. This made a nice 3-D heart decoration.

Stained Glass

We cut a heart shape out of 2 pieces of construction paper (front and back) to make the frame. One of the frames was placed onto wax paper and liquid starch was painted inside the heart shape as well as on the edges of the heart cutout. Students overlapped pink, red, and white pieces of tissue paper to create the stained glass effect. Once the starch dried, the frame was carefully peeled off and the backing was added.

Valentine's Day Collage

Valentine's Day Bags

Each student decorated a white lunch with markers, heart shapes, and stickers.

Valentine's Day Cooking Project

For our special holiday cooking project we made heart shaped pizzas! In the morning the students helped to make the pizza dough from scratch. Once it was done rising they shaped their dough into heart shapes. Homemade pizza sauce, cheese, and mini-peperoni was added by each student.

We labeled each pizza with a slip of wax paper and popped them into the oven for 5 minutes to bake. Here is what they looked like before the students ate them. It was a very yummy lunch made with lots of love.

Our Valentines bags all filled up with love notes and sweet treats.

'V' is for Vase

We learned a lot about the letter V during Valentine's Day week, especially since it just happened to be the letter of the week. Here was our creative way to make a vase full of flowers using the letter.

January Winter Projects

Our theme for January is winter and snow. Here are some of the things we are worked on this month.

Snowman Collage
The children used cotton balls and cut up paper strips.

Bubble Wrap Prints
We used light and bright blue paint.

I cut pieces into rectangles and used packing tape to close up 2 of the ends. It made the perfect bubble wrap mitt for the children's hands. This was the large bubble wrap and I'd love to try it with the tiny bubble wrap as well.

It started getting very blue so a little purple and lavender was in order.

Look at how nice the pattern looks at the end.

Marshmallow Prints
We used large marshmallows and left over paint from bubble prints.

There was a range of creating from organized to overlapping.

Ice Painting 

We use water and food coloring in ice cube trays to make 'paint'. I add cut pieces of drinking straw so that the kids don't freeze their fingers.

Wood Stick Snow Flakes

Ice Melting

We use an ice block, water tinted with food coloring, salt, and eye droppers for this science exploration. The children learn that ice melts in different ways and can see the variations using the colored water. Teachers sprinkle salt on top of the ice block to speed some of the melting process and create channels in the middle of the cube for the water to run down. Our first group used blue water and our second group used red so we also learned about color mixing too.

Rain Clouds

We made these using construction paper, various blue tissue paper, and cotten balls.

Snow Play

Ok, so we don't live in an area where it snows. The next best thing? Shaving cream! The children painted and sculpted with our version of snow.