January 2025! Newsletter Wishing you all a happy New Year! Feliz Ana Nuevo!
Dr. Maria Montessori Quote! “Never help a child with a task at which he feels he can succeed. The greatest sign of success for a teacher… is to be able to say, ’The children are now working as if I did not exist.”
Welcome to the first edition of 2025! We are excited to welcome you all back to start the new year with focus on health and new beginnings.
Important Dates for January 2025: School closed on Wednesday January 1 and January 20: In observance of New Year and Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday respectively.
Gratitude: Heartfelt gratitude for all the thoughtful gifts and cards for MIA staff, much appreciated!
Director’s Note: Some common topics related to young children’s language, self-control, communication will be covered monthly. This month’s topic is Self-control. Helping Young children Learn Self-Control Self-control is a complex skill for young children to learn. Self-control is child’s ability to keep themselves from acting on impulses that hurt themselves or others. It involves thinking ahead and deliberately controlling/inhibiting their own behavior. Self-control and the capacity to feel guilty after doing something wrong are both important developmental tasks that allow children to follow rules and develop a sense of conscience. Children who lack feelings of guilt or self-control often go onto have trouble with their behavior. How can you help a child develop self-control? See misbehaviors as a chance to teach self-control, they are an opportunity to help a child learn to identify and manage feelings of anger, sadness, and disappointment. 1. Set and enforce clear, consistent limits. 2. When a child misbehaves, acknowledge his/her feelings, but let her/him know that what she/he did is not acceptable, i.e, I know you angry, but you cannot throw the toy or hit your brother.” 3. Use logical consequences: when a child throws the toy, show how to use it appropriately, if the child repeats inappropriate action, remove the toy by clearing saying why.
Classroom and Curriculum Update: In the month of January: We will continue to focus on the “Human Body” but with its nutritional needs. The children will be introduced to the “Food Unit” vocabulary like : carbohydrates, protein, vitamins, minerals, the food pyramid, fats and sugars”. Language: We will introduce the sound of “n” and “0” letters. It will be a great time to review and confirm what some of the older children already know and introduce the sound to the younger children. For the children who already know the sound we will help them put it together with a vowel sound to start to read 2 or 3 letter words. Practical Life: Children will work with snowflakes to strengthen their whole hand muscles and pour with them. Math: Count with snowflakes, a polar bears and, penguins, and one to one correspondence. Sciences: We will learn about the body parts of the Polar Bear and the Penguin. They will learn about their body parts and habitats. Art, they are using different mediums of art with Penguin, Polar Bear frame. They will be using watercolors, colored pencils, and feathers. Spanish: Feliz Año Nuevo or Happy New Year! We will continue learning Spanish winter vocabulary such as copos de nieve (snowflakes), hombre de nieve (snowman), árbol de hoja perenne (evergreen tree) and so on. In addition to our winter theme we will be incorporating Spanish with the food unit.