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Patchwork Digest -Friday, May 17th
Announcements
In the Colorado Hometown Weekly Newspaper- K21 Take Stand Stand- Check out the article!
Lost and Found Items- With the end the year around the corner, its time to start rediscovering your childs items in the lost'n found bins, moosh room shoe bin and those packed to the gills childrens cubbies! Also dont foreget to check your parent cubbies!
Summer Camps are filling up- Please make sure to have forms in for summer camp if you are interested since there are few spaces left.
Summer Playdates & Gardening- For all families that are currently enrolled, families that are enrolled for the fall, or families that have attended Patchwork at any time in the past, we are continuing to host our usual Summer Playdates & Gardening! You can come with your children to the school to hang out with other families, participate in our community garden, and even create your own activities and offerings! Playdates are held Wednesday and Friday mornings from 10am-1pm. We only ask for $50 per family for the entire summer to cover our costs of cleaning the school. Just bring us this form along with your check: Summer Playdate Enrollment Form
Patchwork Happenings
Math in K-12! By Michele Beach As relationships have solidified and everyone has become more and more comfortable around each other, the children have allowed themselves to be more vulnerable and take more risks in front of each other. Some examples have been children helping each other with spelling during meeting and even some older children helping younger ones learn to read. In addition there has been a lot of interest in math! Many of the children have learned fractions, some of the younger children have learned to add and subtract, and some of the older children have worked on multiplication and recently on borrowing and carrying with big numbers. The speed with which they are able to learn new concepts is always incredible to watch. Many of them knew from birthdays and other daily usage the term "one half" and as they used some of the hands-on math manipulatives and games very quickly picked up what "one fourth" or "one third" meant. Many of them went on to then be able to read "1/2" or "1/5" and both understand and recognize it. The money game has also recently been a favorite, bringing up topics of decimal points, making change, and making exchanges -- all of this becoming particularly relevant as they helped to make change at the Service Learning Stand this week! When we allow children space to come to these tough topics, they never cease to amaze!
Staff Summer and Fall Plans
Sally
Hi all,
Michele
It's hard to believe we are coming to the end of our 6th year at Patchwork! I am looking forward to a quieter summer, as we finally won't be working to renovate any new spaces at the school! Instead we are working on remodeling our kitchen at home and I can't wait to get the "pantry" out of the living room and back into the kitchen! In addition to home renovation plans, we have a few small road trips planned to visit family, but otherwise we will be enjoying being at home this summer and maybe spending some time at the Memory Square pool! As for next year, I am looking forward to another wonderful year teaching with K-12 and continuing as director. It has been an inspiring year getting to know new children and working with some that have been here for years, watching them truly connect with one another, and learning right alongside them. I feel blessed to have such an incredible job, working with such amazing teachers and families and look forward to seeing you around Louisville this summer or back here in the fall!
Mitch
I am overwhelmed with love and joy looking back on this past school year. I am feeling really grateful to be a part of such a supportive and caring community here at Patchwork! I am going to miss everyone over the summer and I will hopefully get to touch base with many of you at summer camps and farmers markets. I am anticipating an exciting summer spent growing next to the pool in my Moo Moo Dress ordering my husband, Jesse, around. We are very excited to spend the summer in our new Louisville home and walking across the street to community park for the evening events. We were hoping to travel to Thailand this summer but we are even more trilled to take on the journey of becoming parents this September to a baby boy. This fall I will be returning to Patchwork as the Toddler Program director plus many adminstrative positions with the baby in tow. Thank you to eveyone for a wonderful year!!
Haley
Thank you all so much for such a great year. I always find the end of the school year hard and yet exciting with it's sense of closure and change. I am glad to be returning for my 7th fall at Patchwork! Next school year I will be supporting Mitch and the toddler program while she is on maternity leave by working 5 mornings a week with our youngest Patchwork crew and helping to train our new lead Toddler teacher Paige! As soon as Mitch is back, I will also begin training her in some the administrative aspects of the school so she can take over that position mid year. Until then, during the summer, I will be busy planning IDEC 2013 with Sally (please come! it's shaping up to being something quite amazing), growing some food at my home in Longmont, camping at the Sand Dunes, and working part-time at the Boulder Barnes & Noble (so I can load up on some more books, you can never have too many!). Enjoy the Colorado summer and see you in August!
Rebekah
This has been such an amazing first year at Patchwork for me. I have learned so much in so many areas, from all kinds of wonderful and unexpected teachers (especially our children!). Speaking of teachers---in a few short days I will complete my coursework for teaching licensure and be an officially licensed Early Childhood Educator! It has been a lot of hard work, but I am so grateful to have found my calling and my place in the Patchwork community. Next year I am immensely excited about co-teaching with the extraordinary Baxter Lubbs in our new 2/3 group at the preschool! Baxter and I will be the “home base” teachers for that age group, working in conjunction with Christy and Zoe for our mixed-age interactions. This summer I will be working full-time as a nanny, spending lots of one-on-one time with my daughter Ava, and enjoying my newfound freedom from homework!! I am also looking forward to attending IDEC this summer and getting to share ideas with more incredible people who are passionate about making the world a better place.
Introducing Paige Berry! Paige was a theater major at UNC-Greensboro when she developed a strong interest in sharing theater with young children. Soon after college she joined a traveling children’s theater tour in which she performed and led theater workshops for elementary students throughout the Southeast. The joy, the laughter, and the inspiration she experienced, through sharing and engaging in creative, dramatic exploration with children, sparked her interest in early childhood education. Not too long after this experience Paige moved to Boulder to pursue her Master’s in ECE. Through the Boulder Journey School teacher education program and Cu Denver, Paige earned her Masters and became a licensed ECE teacher. Paige is continually inspired by the sheer joy, excitement, curiosity, and wonder with which young children explore the world. Paige sees children as natural learners who deserve time and space to play, explore and discover. Paige believes in supporting and extending children’s thinking by offering experiences, which are open-ended, play-based, child-directed, and connected to children’s interests. Paige seeks to offer children multiple languages of learning through which to express their ideas, and is particularly passionate about incorporating creative movement, music, and drama into experiences. Paige is absolutely thrilled to be joining the Patchwork community as a toddler teacher!
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