Natural, Functional Literacy Development

What is the first letter of the alphabet that most young children learn?  The first letter of their name.  Why?  Because they care; it means something to them.  This concept kind of defines natural, functional literacy.  It's natural because it's part of the child's everyday life and it's functional because it serves a purpose.  The child can say "This is MY name."

Our question as early educators is how to maximize the opportunities for natural, functional literacy development in our programs.  We have to provide a print-rich environment.  We should set up an attractive class library that is in a quiet part of the room and offers a wide variety of books that cover the range of the reading abilities of the children in our care.  Ideally, some of these books will stay the same to provide continuity and repetition, but some of the books will rotate, perhaps according to the season or according to concepts being taught.  

Your dramatic play / housekeeping center probably already has food boxes with printed labels.  How about simple recipe cards and blank cards for children to write their own recipes?  Long strips of paper for children to create shopping lists? A telephone book?  If you change this center out occasionally, how about a menu and an order pad for the customer and server in your restaurant?  

Your writing center is a great place for a simple dictionary.  It may include stationery, envelopes, cards and postcards so that children can write letters to parents, grandparents or friends.  

Your block center can include books about architecture or particular interesting buildings.  Or paper and pens so that children can label their buildings.  How about graph paper so that they can draw "blueprints" of their creations?  Did they build a McDonald's or Home Depot?  Let them make a sign for the building.  Adding cars to your block center?  How about including maps, auto repair manuals, or receipt books for those auto repairs?  

Look around your program and think of other ways in which you can make language more meaningful for the children in your care.

Misty

Ways to Get Smarter in 2012

To go along with last week's theme of new year's resolutions, I found  Newsweek's (January 9,  2012) list of 31 interesting ways to get smarter this year.  You can find the whole list at:  http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2011/12/30/31-ways-to-get-smarter-in-2012.all.html , but here are a few of their suggestions.

• Do word puzzles--can help reduce the risk of Alzheimer's and dementia.
• Learn a new language--to improve your prefontal cortex, which affects decision-making and emotions.  As an added benefit for child care providers, being bilingual can help you attract new customers, or better serve existing customers.
• Eat dark chocolate--(YES!! oh, sorry, I got carried away...)--dark chocolate (and red wine) contain flavonoids which can help improve memory.
• Hydrate--a dehydrated brain has to work harder; and the rest of your body will appreciate the water as well.
• Visit an art museum--viewing art can reduce stress.  Field trip, maybe??
• Learn to play a musical instrument--boosts IQ and can increase memory and coordination.
• Eat yogurt--(I love these eating ones!)--can improve your ability to handle anxiety and increases activity in the parts of the brain that handle emotions and memory.  Your stomach may appreciate the probiotics too.
• Get out of town...and back to nature--time on a crowded street can impair your memory and self-control, but spending some time in nature can help your brain recover.

Have fun taking care of yourself this year!

Misty

Preventing Illness in Child Care

This time of year, more than any other, child care providers battle to keep the children in their care (and their staff) healthy.  The most effective way of doing this, other than simple handwashing, is having a strong illness exclusion policy and following it at all times.  I once worked in a program that had good policy, but implemented it on a case-by-case basis.  We had a lot of illness spread through that program.  

Your illness exclusion policy must meet the minimum requirements set forth by your local licensing agency.  If these requirements are pretty minimal, you have the right to make your own policy stronger.  The National Resource Center for Health and Safety in Child Care and Early Education's publication Caring for Our Children is an excellent resource and can be found at: http://nrckids.org/CFOC3/index.html

Communication is also key in implementing a solid illness exclusion policy.  Staff must understand the requirements of the policy, including when and how to exclude children from care.  Parents must be informed of the policy before enrolling their children, reminded periodically, and be informed exactly of why their child is being sent home at a particular time and when their child can return to care. 

One of the best things we ever did, after many unpleasant discussions with parents who didn't think their children were sick, was to develop a form to go home with each child being excluded for illness.  The form is carefully coordinated with our illness exclusion policy.  It provides a simple explanation of our policy, why, precisely, their child is being excluded and what criteria must be met before the child can return to our care.  This one simple form, when used consistently, has saved us a lot of heartburn.  If you want to use ours, instead of spending hours developing your own, you can find the form, and our illness exclusion policy, at:  http://daycaretools.com/DaycareProducts.aspx#Health

Here's hoping for a relatively painless cold and flu season!

Misty

New Year's Resolutions for Child Care Providers

New Year's Resolutions; to do it or not??  That is the question that many of us ask ourselves each year.  In my humble opinion, they are fine...as long as we don't set ourselves up to fail and don't get too legalistic over them.

I like to look at resolutions as kind of like a visit from the licensing agency or the process of an accreditation self-study.  It's an opportunity to try to step outside of yourself and look at your program (and yourself) with an objective set of eyes.

If you choose to set some resolutions, I do have a few suggestions to consider:

Your Environment--is everything clean and organized?  Do you have daily and weekly cleaning and sanitizing schedules?  Check your toys and materials and see if any of them need to be repaired or replaced.

Your Paperwork--are your tax files complete (and have you claimed all possible expenses!)?  Are your child and staff files complete and well-organized?  Review your contract, policies, forms, etc.  Pay particular attention to any areas that were problems during the previous year and tighten it up for the future.

Your Program--is your program meeting the needs of the children?  Pull a few random developmental checklists, or whatever you use to track children's progress, and make sure you are seeing appropriate growth.  Review some lesson plans from each program to ensure that they are complete, well-thought-out, and developmentally appropriate.

Your Finances--how is your program's financial health?  Is your budget balanced and are you financially prepared for changes in the market, unexpected events, or anticipated changes?  Is it time to increase your fees?  Is your staff paid in such a manner to allow you to maintain high-quality employees?

Your Marketing Program--are you regularly attracting new clients?  Do you have a plan in place to market your program and, if so, how well is it working?  If it is costing you money, are you getting a fair return on your investment?

Your Health and Safety Basics--take time to check your fire extinguishers, replenish your first aid kits, and put new batteries in your smoke detectors.

Your Relationships--how is your relationship with the parents and your staff?  Are there areas that could use improvement?

Yourself--is there anything about yourself that needs to be changed to allow you to function better?  How's your diet, your weight, your exercise, your stress level?  Challenge yourself to improve professionally; enroll in a class or plan to attend a conference.

Remember, the goal of any New Year's resolution is improvement.  Make sure that your goals are reasonable and not so overly ambitious that you don't stand a chance of achieving them.  Good luck and Happy New Year!

Misty

Staffing for Holiday Child Care

"I hope your holidays are wonderful......but I need you to work until 6:00 on Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve."  Ouch.  Unfortunately, since we have parents who sometimes have to work those hours, we sometimes need to as well.  The question becomes how to balance out the needs of the parents with the needs ( or desires) of staff.  

Hopefully, your contract with your parents already indicates the days and/or times that you will be closed, such as Christmas Day, Christmas Eve after 3:00, etc.  You may have contracted with parents to remain open until 6:00 on Christmas Eve, but if only 3 children will be in care from noon to 6:00, you certainly won't want to staff as if it were a regular day.  Determining which children will be in care at that time will enable you to staff appropriately. 

The simplest way  to figure out which parents will actually want to use your services during the typically slow times is to provide them with a survey.  Just ask which children will be in care during what times.  (Of course, if you don't already have that survey created, we have one for you!)  You then know how many employees you will need to have on-site during those times. For the record, I have never had a parent complain about the survey, as long as they understand that I am planning to provide care for my entire contracted time, as needed.

Ideally, your staff will have already turned in their time off requests, or somehow communicated with you if they would prefer to have the hours during the holidays or if they would prefer to have the time off work.  With a little luck, you can match up the needs with the parents with the needs and desires of staff and make as many people happy over the holidays as possible.

Of course, as during any time when a lot of parents are off for vacations, you will probably need to have that discussion about child care fees during vacations, but that is a discussion for  another time for me. 

Merry Christmas!

Misty

The Five Finger Rule: Choosing a "Just Right" Book

How do you choose an appropriate book for a child to read?  Unfortunately many children, especially young or struggling readers, want to read books beyond their ability.  A Harry Potter book may be very intriguing, but most young or struggling readers couldn't read it successfully and would just become frustrated if they tried.   

The first step in selecting an appropriate book is to have the child look at it, read the title and see if it looks appealing.  A book that is simply not appealing is going to be a tough sell, regardless of how well a child can read it.

The next step is to turn to a page in the middle of the book and have the child read 2 or 3 pages.  The child will hold up one finger for every word he struggles with or simply can't decode.  If the child holds up 5 fingers, the book is too difficult and an easier book should be selected.  

The final step is to talk with the child about the book.  Does the child understand what he just read?  Can he read it fluently or is his reading slow and choppy?  Is it interesting?  If a book has met all of these criteria, congratulations; you have found a "just right" book!

Misty

P.S.  If a child insists on a book that is too difficult, read it with him.  You can read it to him or share reading with each of you reading a page or a paragraph and you helping the child with any difficult words.  Our goal is for children to learn to love reading.  This can only happen if they are taught how to avoid frustrating books and find ones that they will enjoy.

The Death of Preschool?

A provocatively titled article in November's Scientific American, "The Death of Preschool?", raises the question of whether child care, as we know it, is dying.  Congress's No Child Left Behind Act has done exactly what many early childhood educators have feared for years.  By providing financial penalties for schools that don't meet certain achievement standards for 3rd grade children, the Act has pushed schools to implement stricter academic standards for younger children.  

Many of us who have been early childhood educators for many years have watched 1st grade standards become Kindergarten standards.  Now, as we have feared, it seems that those Kindergarten standards are becoming the new preschool standards.  Where does it end?

The problem is filled with irony.  First, both long-standing and current research indicate that a developmentally appropriate education is by far the most important early start that we can provide for children.  A developmentally appropriate program provides a solid educational background while encouraging exploration, creativity, and social interactions.  Second, the parents who seem to be pushing hardest for the academic transformation of preschools are often the more educated, wealthier parents.   Those who have the most options for the care of their children are often choosing the least appropriate programs.  

As child care professionals, it is up to us to maintain our standards.  We must be knowledgeable of current research and best practices for the education of young children.  We must continue to provide learning experiences that are developmentally appropriate.  And, we must be able to explain to parents why our developmentally appropriate programs are much better for their children than heavily academic programs.  We must continue to do what is right for children, regardless of outside pressures. 

Misty