From the Principal’s Office
Happy New Year! We wish everyone a very happy and healthy 2019! We enjoyed having you and your child as a part of Chesterbrook Academy during 2018 and we look forward to continuing your child’s early education during 2019!
We are continuing to move forward in the process of NAEYC accreditation. We will submit our final classroom and school portfolios by the end of the month. Once everything is submitted, NAEYC will review our portfolios and then schedule classroom observations. As part of the NAEYC accreditation process, our corporate office has put out an updated Parent Handbook that indicates the alignment of our policies with NAEYC’s standards. All of our existing families should receive a copy of the updated handbook. We distributed a note asking parents to stop at the front desk to pick up their copy and to sign the acknowledgement form that they received the handbook. Many of you have gotten yours, but we still have some who have not. If you haven’t gotten your copy of the updated handbook, please stop by and pick yours up.
As another part of the NAEYC accreditation, we distributed child and family questionnaires and asked they be completed and returned. The questionnaires give the teachers some background information about each child and his/her family. If you still have your questionnaire, please complete and return to the front desk. If you have not received a copy of the questionnaire or have misplaced yours, please stop by the front desk and take a few minutes to complete. When completing the questionnaire, please be sure to put your child’s name or family name on it so we know who it belongs to. Thanks!
Year-end statements for 2018 are now available. Families are able to access the statements through the ALMA parent portal. If you have not set up your account with ALMA, you can find the link in the menu on the school’s website under “For Parents” and click on “My account”. The user name is firstname.lastname of the parent tied to the account. If you prefer, we can print your statement or email you an electronic copy. Please let us know if you would like us to print or email your statement or if you need help accessing your account through ALMA.
Dates
January
January 1st – New Year’s Day ~ Center closed
January 4th – Links to Learning folders returned
January 7th – District 87 School resumes
January 8th – Unit 5 School resumes
January 16th – Unit 5 Late start
January 21st – Unit 5 & District 87 No school
January 26th – Open House 10:00-1:00
January 30th – Unit 5 Late start
January 31st – Links to Learning folders distributed
Open House
January 26, 2019
10:00 – 1:00
For Parents and Teachers
Please join us in our efforts to keep all the children and teachers healthy this winter. Remind your child to cover his or her mouth when coughing or sneezing and to wash hands after covering the cough or sneeze and blowing their nose. Also, remember our illness policy states a child must be symptom free for 24 hours before returning to school. In the case of a fever, this means fever-free for 24 hours without the use of a fever reducer such as Tylenol or Motrin. We understand it can be hard to get time off from work to take care of a sick child but we do know school is the last place a sick child needs or wants to be. Most illnesses are viral and have to run their natural course, so we understand normal runny noses and coughs. It is when a child is exhibiting acute symptoms and is lethargic that we ask he or she stay at home to get the rest needed for a speedier recovery.
For Parents
Please be sure to have a hat and gloves at the school every day; the classrooms go outside when the weather allows. Outside play helps the children physically and mentally, so it is a policy DCFS recommends and we encourage. The decision to go outside is made daily depending on current weather conditions.
Please be sure your child is not bringing outside food into the school. We have some children with severe food allergies and some with dietary restrictions. We monitor the food in the building to make sure children are not exposed to any allergens or foods they are not able to eat. When the children come in eating food, the risk of exposure and a reaction is greater. Please help us with this matter by having your child finish eating before entering the building or by leaving the food in the car.
Reminders
Please check to make sure your child as an extra set of winter clothes in his/her cubby. This needs to include underwear and socks.
Announcements will be posted on radio stations WJBC 1230am, WBNQ 101.5fm and WBWN 104.5fm and their respective websites in the event the school closes because of bad weather. The decision to close will be made by 6:00 a.m.
Information for Consumer Product Safety Recalls:
Website – http://www.cpsc.gov/en/recalls or Mobile app – RECALLS.GOV
Coming Up…
The classrooms will have their Valentine’s Day parties on Thursday, February 14 at 3:00. Signup sheets will be posted in the classrooms for parents to volunteer as room parents or to bring in treats. The children can exchange Valentine cards if desired; teachers will provide a list of names if you would like to address the individual cards.
Our second professional development day is Monday, February 18th. We will be closed all day so our teachers can receive training in new initiatives we will be implementing. We will reopen as normal on Tuesday, February 19th.
Our spring picture days are scheduled for February 20 & 21; we will have two photographers on each day. Besides the individual, sibling and class pictures, we will have graduate pictures done also.
The teachers will distribute the second Parent Report on March 1st. The parent reports will provide information about your child’s progress to this point in the school year. The teachers will also share goals for the children through the remainder of the year. We will offer parent/teacher conferences the week of March 4th for any parents who wish to meet with a teacher after reviewing their child’s parent report.
Unit 5 schools are holding registration for children who will attend kindergarten this fall on March 12th. Parents will need to contact their child’s attendance school to schedule an appointment. District 87 will hold their kindergarten registration in April. You will have to contact your attendance school to learn which day registration will be held on.
Open House
January 26, 2019 10:00 – 1:00
Do you have friends who are moving to the area, having a child or are unhappy with their child’s current preschool? We are always happy to meet other parents like you and offer a tuition credit for parent referrals. Please stop by the office for details.
School Highlights
INFANTS 1: It’s going to be an exciting month of January in the Infant 1 room as we explore the chilly weather. We will read Hibernation Station and pretend to be animals sleeping to escape the cold. Then we will use our five senses to explore water as a liquid then as a solid piece of ice. Finally, we will develop our wellness skills as we create snowmen using all types of materials, such as paint, buttons, loofahs and slime!
TODDLERS: The toddlers had a fun filled month! We read a lot of books about the holidays and had a blast playing with real snow! We worked on recognizing and saying the colors red and green in our daily activities and looking for them in our books. The kids loved listening to our holiday CD and dancing along.
BEGINNER 1: During December we learned about various holidays including Christmas and Hanukkah. We made a dreidel and explored the colors of Hanukkah. We also did a unit on ducks and learned about how ducks grow. We did many sorting and matching duck activities.
BEGINNER 2: Happy New Year! The children in the Beginner 2 room will be busy working on recognizing their names and tracing letters. We will talk about the weather and explore and discuss various temperatures. We will work on our counting skills and repeating the numbers 1-20 in English and Spanish. Our cutting skills will be further explored, and we will work on throwing a bean bag at a target. Our books will focus on winter weather and animals. We will read The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats, The Mitten by Jan Brett, Penguins, Penguins Everywhere by Bob Barner, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen and The Very Cranky Bear by Nick Bland.
INTERMEDIATE 1: The month of December found the Intermediate children learning about hibernation and various holiday celebrations from around the world. The students explored a variety of hibernation related items that sunk and floated. They identified their favorite animal that hibernates on the class graph. The children had a blast pretending to be bears storing up winter food and sleeping in the cave. To learn about holidays around the world, we talked about and showed pictures of fancy cakes made in South Korea. The children were given a cake topper with a number from 1-10 on it and they matched the cake topper to the cake with the same number.
INTERMEDIATE 2: December found the Intermediate 2 children learning about Hanukkah, Kwanza and Christmas. We worked on spelling our names and counting. Next month we will increase how high we count, introduce the New Year and learn about many new animals! Happy New Year!
PRE-K 1: I hope everyone had a Happy Holiday and a great New Year. The Pre-k 2 children will be starting January off with New Year activities and reading The Night Before New Year’s. Also, the class will be learning about the artist, Georges Seurat and paint a picture using his technique. The second week of January, the class will be reading Bear Snores On. They will learn what hibernation means and what animals hibernate. The third week in January, the class will be reading Down by the Station. They will learn about different modes of transportation and write about where they would want to go if they were in an airplane. The fourth week in January, the class will read The Mitten. They will work on what order the animals went into the mitten and have fun using paint to design their own mittens. The last week, the class will be reading Penguins, Pengins, Everywhere! They will draw a penguin using different colors of ice to draw their pictures. Also, they will name different arctic animals and learn the letter sounds for the beginning and ending letters of the animals’ names.
PRE-K 2: Happy New Year from the Pre-k 2 classroom! We hope everyone had a great holiday season! Thank you to everyone who came to our classroom holiday party and who brought in special treats. This month we will be learning about the solar system. We will learn about planets and we will be turning our dramatic play into a space station. The students will fly a spaceship and become astronauts. We will also do a two week lesson on transportation with a focus on airports for the first week. The students will work at an airport and learn all about what you need when you travel. For another fun unit this month, we will be doing a lesson on hospitals and different community helpers that help keep us healthy. We will be learning about different healthy foods during this unit as well. Just a friendly reminder that as the weather has become older, our clothing attire has changed. Please be sure to switch your child’s extra change of clothes from summer clothing to winter clothing. Also, we will go outdoors when the weather permits, so please be sure your children come to school with their winter coats, hats and gloves daily. We hope everyone has a very happy new year!
From the Education Department
January, 2019
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Topics: Language & Literacy
As children begin the toddler stage, they respond to familiar words by shouting, gesturing or reaching for objects. As their language skills develop, their babbles evolve into a mix of real and made-up words and phrases. They learn to express their needs and wants with language and rely less on[.....]
Read More »
Janaury 2019 Newsletter
From the Principal’s Office
Happy New Year! We wish everyone a very happy and healthy 2019! We enjoyed having you and your child as a part of Chesterbrook Academy during 2018 and we look forward to continuing your child’s early education during 2019!
We are continuing to move forward in the process of NAEYC accreditation. We will submit our final classroom and school portfolios by the end of the month. Once everything is submitted, NAEYC will review our portfolios and then schedule classroom observations. As part of the NAEYC accreditation process, our corporate office has put out an updated Parent Handbook that indicates the alignment of our policies with NAEYC’s standards. All of our existing families should receive a copy of the updated handbook. We distributed a note asking parents to stop at the front desk to pick up their copy and to sign the acknowledgement form that they received the handbook. Many of you have gotten yours, but we still have some who have not. If you haven’t gotten your copy of the updated handbook, please stop by and pick yours up.
As another part of the NAEYC accreditation, we distributed child and family questionnaires and asked they be completed and returned. The questionnaires give the teachers some background information about each child and his/her family. If you still have your questionnaire, please complete and return to the front desk. If you have not received a copy of the questionnaire or have misplaced yours, please stop by the front desk and take a few minutes to complete. When completing the questionnaire, please be sure to put your child’s name or family name on it so we know who it belongs to. Thanks!
Year-end statements for 2018 are now available. Families are able to access the statements through the ALMA parent portal. If you have not set up your account with ALMA, you can find the link in the menu on the school’s website under “For Parents” and click on “My account”. The user name is firstname.lastname of the parent tied to the account. If you prefer, we can print your statement or email you an electronic copy. Please let us know if you would like us to print or email your statement or if you need help accessing your account through ALMA.
Dates
January
January 1st – New Year’s Day ~ Center closed
January 4th – Links to Learning folders returned
January 7th – District 87 School resumes
January 8th – Unit 5 School resumes
January 16th – Unit 5 Late start
January 21st – Unit 5 & District 87 No school
January 26th – Open House 10:00-1:00
January 30th – Unit 5 Late start
January 31st – Links to Learning folders distributed
Open House
January 26, 2019
10:00 – 1:00
For Parents and Teachers
Please join us in our efforts to keep all the children and teachers healthy this winter. Remind your child to cover his or her mouth when coughing or sneezing and to wash hands after covering the cough or sneeze and blowing their nose. Also, remember our illness policy states a child must be symptom free for 24 hours before returning to school. In the case of a fever, this means fever-free for 24 hours without the use of a fever reducer such as Tylenol or Motrin. We understand it can be hard to get time off from work to take care of a sick child but we do know school is the last place a sick child needs or wants to be. Most illnesses are viral and have to run their natural course, so we understand normal runny noses and coughs. It is when a child is exhibiting acute symptoms and is lethargic that we ask he or she stay at home to get the rest needed for a speedier recovery.
For Parents
Please be sure to have a hat and gloves at the school every day; the classrooms go outside when the weather allows. Outside play helps the children physically and mentally, so it is a policy DCFS recommends and we encourage. The decision to go outside is made daily depending on current weather conditions.
Please be sure your child is not bringing outside food into the school. We have some children with severe food allergies and some with dietary restrictions. We monitor the food in the building to make sure children are not exposed to any allergens or foods they are not able to eat. When the children come in eating food, the risk of exposure and a reaction is greater. Please help us with this matter by having your child finish eating before entering the building or by leaving the food in the car.
Reminders
Please check to make sure your child as an extra set of winter clothes in his/her cubby. This needs to include underwear and socks.
Announcements will be posted on radio stations WJBC 1230am, WBNQ 101.5fm and WBWN 104.5fm and their respective websites in the event the school closes because of bad weather. The decision to close will be made by 6:00 a.m.
Information for Consumer Product Safety Recalls:
Website – http://www.cpsc.gov/en/recalls or Mobile app – RECALLS.GOV
Coming Up…
The classrooms will have their Valentine’s Day parties on Thursday, February 14 at 3:00. Signup sheets will be posted in the classrooms for parents to volunteer as room parents or to bring in treats. The children can exchange Valentine cards if desired; teachers will provide a list of names if you would like to address the individual cards.
Our second professional development day is Monday, February 18th. We will be closed all day so our teachers can receive training in new initiatives we will be implementing. We will reopen as normal on Tuesday, February 19th.
Our spring picture days are scheduled for February 20 & 21; we will have two photographers on each day. Besides the individual, sibling and class pictures, we will have graduate pictures done also.
The teachers will distribute the second Parent Report on March 1st. The parent reports will provide information about your child’s progress to this point in the school year. The teachers will also share goals for the children through the remainder of the year. We will offer parent/teacher conferences the week of March 4th for any parents who wish to meet with a teacher after reviewing their child’s parent report.
Unit 5 schools are holding registration for children who will attend kindergarten this fall on March 12th. Parents will need to contact their child’s attendance school to schedule an appointment. District 87 will hold their kindergarten registration in April. You will have to contact your attendance school to learn which day registration will be held on.
Open House
January 26, 2019 10:00 – 1:00
Do you have friends who are moving to the area, having a child or are unhappy with their child’s current preschool? We are always happy to meet other parents like you and offer a tuition credit for parent referrals. Please stop by the office for details.
School Highlights
INFANTS 1: It’s going to be an exciting month of January in the Infant 1 room as we explore the chilly weather. We will read Hibernation Station and pretend to be animals sleeping to escape the cold. Then we will use our five senses to explore water as a liquid then as a solid piece of ice. Finally, we will develop our wellness skills as we create snowmen using all types of materials, such as paint, buttons, loofahs and slime!
TODDLERS: The toddlers had a fun filled month! We read a lot of books about the holidays and had a blast playing with real snow! We worked on recognizing and saying the colors red and green in our daily activities and looking for them in our books. The kids loved listening to our holiday CD and dancing along.
BEGINNER 1: During December we learned about various holidays including Christmas and Hanukkah. We made a dreidel and explored the colors of Hanukkah. We also did a unit on ducks and learned about how ducks grow. We did many sorting and matching duck activities.
BEGINNER 2: Happy New Year! The children in the Beginner 2 room will be busy working on recognizing their names and tracing letters. We will talk about the weather and explore and discuss various temperatures. We will work on our counting skills and repeating the numbers 1-20 in English and Spanish. Our cutting skills will be further explored, and we will work on throwing a bean bag at a target. Our books will focus on winter weather and animals. We will read The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats, The Mitten by Jan Brett, Penguins, Penguins Everywhere by Bob Barner, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen and The Very Cranky Bear by Nick Bland.
INTERMEDIATE 1: The month of December found the Intermediate children learning about hibernation and various holiday celebrations from around the world. The students explored a variety of hibernation related items that sunk and floated. They identified their favorite animal that hibernates on the class graph. The children had a blast pretending to be bears storing up winter food and sleeping in the cave. To learn about holidays around the world, we talked about and showed pictures of fancy cakes made in South Korea. The children were given a cake topper with a number from 1-10 on it and they matched the cake topper to the cake with the same number.
INTERMEDIATE 2: December found the Intermediate 2 children learning about Hanukkah, Kwanza and Christmas. We worked on spelling our names and counting. Next month we will increase how high we count, introduce the New Year and learn about many new animals! Happy New Year!
PRE-K 1: I hope everyone had a Happy Holiday and a great New Year. The Pre-k 2 children will be starting January off with New Year activities and reading The Night Before New Year’s. Also, the class will be learning about the artist, Georges Seurat and paint a picture using his technique. The second week of January, the class will be reading Bear Snores On. They will learn what hibernation means and what animals hibernate. The third week in January, the class will be reading Down by the Station. They will learn about different modes of transportation and write about where they would want to go if they were in an airplane. The fourth week in January, the class will read The Mitten. They will work on what order the animals went into the mitten and have fun using paint to design their own mittens. The last week, the class will be reading Penguins, Pengins, Everywhere! They will draw a penguin using different colors of ice to draw their pictures. Also, they will name different arctic animals and learn the letter sounds for the beginning and ending letters of the animals’ names.
PRE-K 2: Happy New Year from the Pre-k 2 classroom! We hope everyone had a great holiday season! Thank you to everyone who came to our classroom holiday party and who brought in special treats. This month we will be learning about the solar system. We will learn about planets and we will be turning our dramatic play into a space station. The students will fly a spaceship and become astronauts. We will also do a two week lesson on transportation with a focus on airports for the first week. The students will work at an airport and learn all about what you need when you travel. For another fun unit this month, we will be doing a lesson on hospitals and different community helpers that help keep us healthy. We will be learning about different healthy foods during this unit as well. Just a friendly reminder that as the weather has become older, our clothing attire has changed. Please be sure to switch your child’s extra change of clothes from summer clothing to winter clothing. Also, we will go outdoors when the weather permits, so please be sure your children come to school with their winter coats, hats and gloves daily. We hope everyone has a very happy new year!
From the Education Department
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