Preschool News
October 7, 2023
School Days
10/22/23
Hello Rodman Preschool Families,
We had a great week! Please remember that this Friday is an Early Release day, which means school dismisses at 11:35am. See below for other happening of PreK and other community events including:
-Upcoming Dates
-Self-Regulation Station
-Preschool Screenings - Teacher and School Psychologist
-School Council Volunteer Request
-CAPT News
-Rodman Lending Library
-CORI and fingerprinting
-Bag donations
-Snapshots of Week
-World Events
-Cantonstock
-Around Town Events
Best Regards,
Shelley Needle, MS, BCBA, LABA
Interim Early Childhood Coordinator
781-821-5060 X 1505
Upcoming Dates
Oct 27th - Early Release Day
Nov 7th - Professional Development - No School
Nov 10th - Veteran's Day - No School
Nov 13-17t - Book Fair
Nov 16th - Parent Conferences (evening)
Nov 17th - Early Release - Parent Conferences
Nov 23rd-24th - Thanksgiving Break - No School
Self-Regulation Station
Social Emotional Lesson Update:
Our students have been learning about feelings during our social emotional learning (SEL) lessons with Ms. Anna. This week we are learning about Happy, Mad, and Sad feelings, and playing a feeling guessing game!
During each SEL lesson, the students are also learning two new breathing exercises that correspond with a letter of the alphabet. These are adapted from the book Alphabreaths by Chirstopher Willard and Daniel Rechtschaffen. The students are learning that they can use these breathing exercises to help them calm down when they are upset. This week we are learning Alligator Breaths and Butterfly Breaths! Feel free to try them yourself and practice with your children!
Preschool Screenings - Note From Teachers
Rodman Preschool Families,
At the Rodman Preschool, we do a number of assessments to help monitor student progress and help better identify student needs for program decision making, instruction, and curriculum. We will start our developmental screeners soon on all community peers. These take a quick look at cognitive, language, and motor development. Screenings will happen after our regular dismissal time (1pm). Teachers will reach out directly to you for scheduling. We will share results with you during parent conferences. Please reach out if you have any questions.
Sincerely,
Rodman Teachers
Preschool Screenings - Note from School Psychologist
We are excited to announce that we will be starting our universal social emotional screening process next week!
As you know, our school community prioritizes understanding and supporting the needs of our students, and we recognize that social emotional skills are essential to preschool and our young learners! These values have led us to conduct universal social emotional screening for all our students, in order to best understand their unique needs in school and at home.
The screening tool that we are using is called the BASC-3 Behavioral and Emotional Screening System (BESS). The BESS is an age-normed screening survey designed for the preschool population.This quick screening system will help us identify social emotional areas of vulnerability (e.g. anxiety), which will help us individualize our classroom support to meet our students' needs.
Classroom teachers will be completing a survey for each child. In addition, we will be sending you a parent survey via email. By seeing both the parent and teacher perspectives, we can get a better sense of your child’s needs across all environments. The way the account is set up only allows for one parent email per student. However, if you want to fill out two screeners, let us know and we are happy to send a hard copy home. Hard copies are also available to anyone if preferred!
This survey will be sent out later this week and should only take a few minutes. If you have any questions, please email Anna Russo at russoa@cantonma.org.
Please let us know if you have any questions about the screening process. We are excited for this opportunity to better understand our young learners!
School Council Members - Important Volunteer Opportunity!
Preschool Families, we are looking for volunteers for the Rodman School Council. Members will meet once a month to discuss progress and program goals for the Rodman Early Childhood Program. Please reach out if you are interested in volunteering for this VERY important role. We look forward to hearing from you! Shelley Needle evanss@cantonma.org
CAPT NEWS
Our Next Meeting will be November 8th. We’re looking for dedicated parents to help support CAPT’s mission by helping plan and work events, attend monthly meetings, as well as supporting the Rodman staff and students. We need your help to make sure keep CAPT going and provide enrichment and fun for families throughout the year and in the upcoming years.
CAPT is still looking for classroom Volunteers!!!
CLASSROOM VOLUNTEERS
Interested in getting more involved at the Rodman? CAPT invites you to sign up as a Classroom Volunteer! These are examples of ways classroom volunteers can help:
o Being a guest story reader in your child’s classroom
o Assisting with arts and crafts in your child’s classroom
o Helping on the playground
o Helping at lunchtime
o Organizing books and other classroom materials
Classroom volunteers must have a CORI form on file. Please email rodman.prek.capt@gmail.com to sign up, or for more information!
Final Classroom Volunteer Flyer.pdf
Spirit Wear is here!!!! Take a look and order soon!!! We will be selling hoodies and fleeces this fall as a fundraiser. See attached flier to learn more.
Please look through your closets!! CAPT is holding a coat drive for COAT’s for Kids Program. Bring in gently used children’s and adults winter jackets. There will be a box located at the entrance to the school and feel free to send in with your child. Every little bit helps. We are looking for a volunteer to periodically drop coats off at Anton's cleaners, contact rodman.prek.capt@gmail.com.
Rodman Preschool Lending Library
Our lending library is stocked FULL of great reads for your little one. Feel free to look through and find you and your child's perfect read for home. To keep our books available to all, please be sure to write in your name and the book title on the designated clipboard near by. Thanks and happy reading!!!
CORI and Fingerprinting
Reminder:
A CORI check IS required for all volunteers.
Fingerprinting IS required if you are interested in volunteering with direct and unmonitored interactions with students. This included chaperoning field trips.
Fingerprinting is NOT required if you are volunteering under supervision of a school staff member. This included room parents, guest speakers and volunteers at field day events.
*They can take awhile to process so please fill them out early so they have enough time to be returned prior to a field trip or volunteer opportunity
Please provide a copy of your fingerprinting receipt to Susan Crespi crespis@cantonma.org to let us know you completed fingerprinting.
Bag Donations
We are looking for plastic bag donations (grocery size) for our classrooms/bathrooms. They are often used for disposal of items, dirty clothes, etc. If you have any extra plastic bags, we will gladly take the donation. Thanks in advance!
Rodman Preschool Staff
Snapshots of the Week 😄
World Events
Though geographically far in distance, emotional impacts of recent world occurrences can be felt within our community in ways we may not expect. We are ready to support all of our students, especially those who have relatives and friends in areas of violence and conflict in Israel. If your child needs support in school to process events, please reach out to Shelley Needle or Anna Russo, School Psychologist. Classroom teachers will not initiate conversations about war and conflict, but they will guide and respond to students in developmentally appropriate ways if questions arise.
Below are some suggested resources:
How to talk to your children about war and conflict.
Resources For Educators, Families To Discuss The Events In Israel And Gaza With Students
Our collective role is to ensure our students develop the knowledge, skills, and tools they need to understand the world around them.
Cantonstock 2023
MUSICCOUNTS! and the Canton Performing Arts Department proudly present Cantonstock 2023 on November 4th 12-4pm.
- Cantonstock is the annual music extravaganza that showcases hundreds of student musicians representing all performing ensembles in the Canton schools, and is the primary fundraiser for MusicCounts, the volunteer, non-profit group dedicated to supporting all music programs in all the Canton Public Schools!
- The mission is to raise funds for music programming for all students! Visit our website at: www.MusicCountsinCanton.org
Here are several ways you can help:
Sponsor a Student for Cantonstock (https://donorbox.org/musiccounts-sponsorstudentcantonstock-2-2-2)
T-shirt orders must be received by October 16th! Each student who receives $50 in sponsors will receive this year’s version of the popular Cantonstock T-Shirt! Shirts are 100% Cotton and the colors change each year so students enjoy collecting them as they progress through the schools! (Additional students in the same household only need to raise $15 each to qualify for a shirt too!)
Be an Individual Sponsor (https://donorbox.org/musiccounts-individual-sponsors-2021-2-2)
This option gives you different donation levels to select from and isn't tied to a specific student or deadline. We'll be happy to recognize your contribution on our website, social media, and other channels too!
Be a Business or Organizational Sponsor (https://donorbox.org/musiccounts-business-sponsors-2021-2-2)
We’re so grateful to the businesses and organizations for their past support, and hope they continue again this year. We’d really love to add new business and organizational sponsors too! Please view our current and previous list of sponsors and be sure to support them!
• Learn More & Get Involved (https://www.musiccountsincanton.org/contactus.html)
Visit our website to learn more about MusicCounts and all the great things we’ve funded the past few years. Contact Us to Donate an Item for Raffle and Silent Auction, become a volunteer and more!
MusicCounts in Canton! • P.O. Box 182 • Canton, MA 02021 • CantonMusicCounts@gmail.com
Around Town Events
Canton Public Schools has a Community Resources and Information Page on its website titled Around Town. This page lists resources and events taking place in our community. To access the information on this webpage, use this link: About/Around Town.
- Canton Public Library Solar Eclipse Viewing Party
- Canton Public Library Jack-o-Lantern Carving
This webpage will be updated periodically.