Are we ready?

I hope so. On Monday morning, our class will arrive at 9 am, and Kickstart is going to hit the ground running. Here's our daily schedule:

circle time

9:00-9:30 breakfast
9:30-10:00 circle time - calendar, weather, songs, dancing, books
10:00-10:30 outdoor play
10:30-10:45 snack and "planning for play"
10:45-12:00 centers: art, dramatic play, science/math, reading/writing, blocks
12:00-12:30 lunch
12:30-1:30 quiet time
1:30-2:15 field trip or special activity led by guest teacher
2:15-3:00 outdoor play and pick-up


Some days, we'll switch our afternoon activity and centers to accomodate morning field trips.

Here's the best news: our recently empty bookshelf is now stocked with amazing books! We're ordering a few more - mostly wordless books for kids to "read" themselves or to others, so we'll be adding to our shelf in the coming weeks.

dramatic play 

art center

So, in the meantime, we'll be casually perusing kids' books (such fun - remember Stella Luna? Brown Bear, Brown Bear? Chicka Chicka Boom Boom? seriously, I might just quit college and go back to preschool) and practicing our "good morning!" songs and dances. 


We'll see you on Monday with stories and photos from an eventful first day - spread the word and check back often!

The Official Kickstart Calendar makes its debut

Our classroom

Bucket-fillers

Reading and writing center

Circle time

Book donations from Randi 

The Team

Miss Sydney is a rising junior at Wesleyan majoring in Psychology and Sociology. Originally from Atlanta, Sydney loves dance, yoga, cooking, and working with kids at Macdonough School.

Miss Taylor, a Wesleyan senior, loves working with kids and being a part of the Macdonough community. Her favorite activities include playing the piano, going to the beach, and spending time with her wonderful family.

 Miss Felicia is a recent graduate of Central CT State University with a degree in Elementary Education. Felicia loves reading, spending time with her family and going to the beach!













Miss Julia, a Wesleyan junior, loves to make art and bake, especially cakes. She also enjoys camping and hiking, and is so excited to work with your kids!

Wake up and smell the DIY

IKEA. If we've learned anything this week, it's that the five of us can find a classroom purpose for nearly every item in the store. We resisted the plush kitchen sets and decided against furniture purchases, but next year - when we've had a year to fund-raise and we're fully funded - we're going to go WILD on our classroom shopping trips.  


Favorite purchases include bath sponges for painting, floor pillows for our reading corner, plates and cups for snack time, a class "pet" for each child to adopt for a night, a bright blue rope to help us line up for field trips, colorful straws for counting and art, and plenty of paintbrushes.

Our art center supplies

We are so, SO appreciative to our friends at the MXCC Preschool at Macdonough School for trusting us with their wonderful classroom! We moved in today and set up all of our centers - reading/writing, dramatic play, art, math/science - and arranged our "circle time" area.

Back in the conference room, we sifted through materials from the lab's storage room and found phenomenal books and posters for calendar, weather, counting, sorting, and graphing lessons.

Anna's full trunk

Anna also brought over a car full of toys (including cars, trains, and kitchen supplies for dramatic play) and blocks from her house that her kids are graciously sharing with us for the summer.

The Kickstart team and our classroom

We're drafting our first newsletter - come Monday morning, each child's cubby will be full! Tomorrow we'll finish setting up the classroom and preparing for the first day of Kickstart!

The dollar store

Today, after an impromptu visit to KidCity - technically with the purpose of scheduling our field trip (which we successfully did) - we went shopping for our classroom. We bought lanterns to decorate our room, buckets for "bucket-filling" (more on that later), huge sketchpads for each kid to use every day, beans for our shakers, pasta for necklaces and print-making, spray bottles for water play, flower necklaces for dramatic play, pipe cleaners for...everything, and SO MUCH MORE. Felicia, our resident check-list/post-it expert, was able to cross off most of the things on our supply list. Tomorrow we visit IKEA and Michael's to finish up.

For those of our supporters who live in the Middletown area, we're seeking donations of toys, books, costumes, art supplies, and any other preschool-friendly materials. We're building our Kindergarten Kickstart home from a now-empty classroom, so we'd appreciate all the help we can get as we decorate and stock up!

The Alpacas Are Coming!

Plans are being finalized for field trips and special visits! I just spoke to Bobbie Tundermann from the Summer Brook Valley Farm - she'll be visiting with her alpaca friends on July 26 during our Animals and Insects week!

We're also penciled in for trips to KidCity, Russell Library, It's Only Natural Restaurant, O'Rourkes, our NEAT community garden, and the Middletown Fire Station.


Here are some highlights from our calendar as planned so far:


My Classroom, My Country, My World!

• flag-making
• 4th of July parade
• quilting

Music and Movement

• ribbon dancing
• creative movement workshop
• sound mural painting
• yoga and breathing 

Food! Kitchen, Farms and Grocery Stores

• "food lab" taste tests
• sandwich collages
• pizza math
• energy ball workshop
• gardening lesson

Animals and Insects

• binocular-making and bird-watching 
• paper-plate spiders
• handprint caterpillars

Our Neighborhood

• ABC community walks
• handprint art
• trusting community helpers

Next on the to-do list: shopping for our classroom. Five days until we kickstart Kickstart!

S