St. Martin's Preschool
7547 East Brainerd Road
Chattanooga, Tennessee 37421
Phone: 423-855-1011
Fax: 423-899-1083
Notes to current 2009-2010 Parents
MAY 2010
The
4’s classes graduation will be on Friday, May 28. The reservation forms and a 4GB flash drive
are due between now and May 21.
The last day of school for the 3-day
3-year old class will be on Wednesday, May 26.
The 2-day 3-year old classes will end the school year on Thursday, May
27. We hope to have Fun in the Sun days on
May 24 and 25 with lots of outside water play and games! Please send the preschoolers in bathing
suits or shorts that you don’t mind getting wet, flip flops or crocs and send a
change of clothes and a small towel.
Please put sunscreen on them before they come to school.
Please write on your calendar that your first tuition payment is due any time
between now and July 1. Some parents just send me checks all summer
and that is fine (
In
August, I will send you a letter about Fall orientation on:
Thursday, September 2 for 5-day 4’s, 2-day 3’s and Tues-Thurs Beginnings
Friday, September 3 for 3-day 3’s and 4’s and Mon-Fri Beginnings.
Only
new students will need a yellow Tennessee Preschool Immunization Certificate or
Georgia’s comparable form.
The
preschoolers are required to have a standard sized backpack without wheels that they can wear on their backs. The backpack should be big enough for
their lunchbox, possibly a jacket and school papers. I am telling you now for your summer
shopping.
Your
summer ‘homefun’ is to READ, READ,
READ to your children. For practice, you
might try workbooks sold at School Box and other office stores like ‘Summer
Bridge Activities’ by Carson Dellosa or ‘Summer Express’ by Scholastic. These are age appropriate and for fun and not
to drill them. The more you encourage
their brains to think, the better readers and, therefore, the better students
they will be. Also, write with, draw
with, color with, cut with, playdoh with, lego with…….your child/ren. The better their small motor skills, the better writers they will be. Running, jumping, pedaling, climbing, playing
in dirt and water, exploring the woods will peak their interest in nature and
strengthen those gross motor skills. Your modeling all of these skills by hand
(not keyboard) will let them know this is good. That is why we do the calendars
by hand, draw pictures on notes, etc.
Those precious little brains or hands don’t go on vacation and need your stimulation
for the learning that goes on every minute of their busy days! To enhance that experience, you might
consider letting them get their own card from the public library and join the
library summer reading program. They can
participate if you read books to them. I
quote Jim Trelease, author of The Read Aloud Handbook, who says,
’reading aloud is the most important gift you can give your child.’ You have totally blown away our Scholastic
Book Club Care Project and you have earned 100 books per class, 8 classes, to
send to children on military bases.
Thanks for your good work!
Many
of you have asked about holidays and
events next school year so that you might plan vacations. Below is the capsule version based on
Hamilton County Schools holidays and, as they say, subject to change
(www.hcde.org):
First
tuition payment due by July 1
Orientation
Sept. 1, 2, 3
Classes
begin Sept 7
Fall
break Oct 18-22
Thanksgiving
Nov 24-26
Christmas
Dec 20-Jan 4
MLK
holiday Jan 17
Presidents
day holiday Feb 21
Spring
break March 21-25
Good
Friday closed April 22
Graduation
for 4’s May 27
Thank you Greta Gentle, Carson’s and Cooper’s Mom, for doing a
great job this year as PreSchool Board Parent Representative. Thank you Beth
Lewis for heading up the Parent Advisory Board and to all of the Class
Parents: Barbara Haimelin, Emilia Jones,
Christa Henry, Annette Pote, Courtney altfillisch, Jenny Taylor, Katy Clark,
Janis Kelman, Tracy Puhlman and Emma Veys.
Thank you also Tracey Stevens and Emma Veys for all of your hard work in
pulling together our Teacher surprises.
Thank
you, for honoring us with a Teacher appreciation week of lots of food and
goodies. We also look forward to a
lovely end-of-the-year luncheon and shopping in the summer. We consider the time we get to spend with
your children as our blessing and to have gifts on top of that is icing on the
cake! THANK YOU, THANK YOU parents for a wonderful year of PreSchool! You
are members of our preschool family, we will never forget you and we hope you
will drop by to visit every once in a while!
To
our ‘graduates’ we say farewell with
great affection. We have known some of
you since you were tiny babies and some of you for up to four years in
PreSchool. We know that we have given
our departing students a good start by making learning fun. We have also empowered them with confidence
by introducing them to many of the skills and activities that they will face
next year. We are so glad that we were a
part of a very special time in their young lives!
During
the summer I will be in the preschool
office a few days a week and will check the answering machine and return
your calls. Even if I am out of town I
will check phone messages and my e-mail at stmartinspreschool@comcast.net.
I will update the preschool section of our website at stmartinsec.org with fall information. You may mail checks to preschool or drop them
by with Barb from 9-12 each day. She can
also answer most questions at 892-9131.
We look forward to seeing our returning families in the Fall for our 26th
year of
Have a terrific summer!