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Lakeside Presbyterian Church Weekday Preschool

October 2009 Newsletter

October 2009

NO PROGRAMS ON FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2

School News

4th Annual Fall Festival and Bazaar
Our Best Fall Festival & Bazaar Ever is Saturday, October 3rd with a Bazaar “Preview Night” for adults only on Friday, October 2nd. Discounted tickets are still available for the preview night please email the preschool office. The festival features food, shopping, inflatables, and games. It will be held rain or shine. Don’t worry, we’ll move all the fun indoors! All of the proceeds from the Bazaar and games benefit the God Is Good Scholarship Fund this year. The GIGSF is assisting 12 families this year who could not have otherwise enrolled their child/children in one of our programs, twice the number usually requesting assistance. Volunteers are still needed. Please consider donating your time to this event. Just one hour from everyone will make a huge difference! If you are receiving assistance, this is a wonderful opportunity to give back with your time. Thank you to all our parents who will make this effort a success. If you haven’t volunteered, do it today! Click here to volunteer.

Fire Safety Activities
The playgroup and preschool classes will be visited at the preschool by the Henrico County Fire Department on Friday, October 9 at 9:30 am.The firefighters will do a fire safety presentation for the children inside followed by visits to the fire truck outside. The presentation will be held downstairs in the fellowship hall.  Children who do not normally attend school on Friday may come for the fun, but parents must remain with them for the presentation.  They may not come for the regular school day. The Pre-K and Kindergarten children will take a field trip to the Lakeside Fire Station on Thursday October 8 at 10:00 am. We will need parent drivers/ chaperones on this field trip. If you can help, be sure to let us know on the permission slips coming home October 2.

Pumpkin Patch Field Trip
The Pre-K and Kindergarten classes will go to Hanover Vegetable Farm to visit the pumpkin patch on October 23. We will need parent drivers/ chaperones on this field trip. If you can help, be sure to let us know on the permission slips coming home October 16.

Pumpkin Party
Our school celebration of all things pumpkin will be held on Friday, October 30. Look for more information about this fun day to come home with your child later in the month.  We will need volunteers to help with the party so if you are available and would like to help, email the preschool office.  We will be using 2 liter soda bottles for a craft at the party.  If you have any empty 2 liter bottles at home please send them in with your child this month.

Program Updates
Toddlers Morning Out class has moved. The “new” place just wasn’t working like we envisioned, so the staff asked to move back to it’s original space. Thank you to the staff for their “new vision” and putting in the extra time needed to get the move done and to our TMO parents for your patience and support.

Staff Updates
Mrs. Rebecca Layton, the teacher for the Toddler Morning Out, will be the contact for the Toddlers Morning Out class. Parents will first communicate directly with her about anything concerning the Toddler Morning Out program, then Mrs. Amrhein if necessary. Mrs. Spalding, the former TMO coordinator is now focusing her full attention to the Extended Hours program. Parents will first communicate directly with her about anything concerning the Extended Hours program, AM and/or PM, then Mrs. Amrhein when necessary.

Mrs. Marjorie Hodges has joined the TMO class as a second classroom assistant Monday through Friday. Marjorie is one of the staff leaders for Overbrook Presbyterian Church’s Oasis After School program and her son Isaiah is in our Kindergarten class!

Mrs. Janet Chatless has joined the PM Extended Hours staff on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays 3-5pm. Janet is a classroom assistant for a special needs class in a Henrico County Public School and she is playgroup student Addison Harris’ aunt (Dad’s sister)! 

Scholastic Book Club Orders
Carol Hudson will be the coordinator for our Scholastic Book Club Orders. October flyers went home on Sept. 23rd & 24th. Many of you also receive the Scholastic forms from your older children’s schools, but we hope you will consider ordering a few times from our flyers. When you order, the Preschool receives points that give the teachers the opportunity to order new books and/or educational games for their classrooms.. The points are also used to give each child a special book for Christmas. The flyers will come out each month and a deadline date will always be given. If you have any questions, please contact Mrs. Hudson through her email address on the preschool website or at . 
The Scholastic link to order books is:  http://www.scholastic.com/parentordering - Click on Parent and then put in the user name (Lakeside) and password (cluborders). The site is secure and you can order online using your credit card. Thank you all for ordering Scholastic books through Lakeside Preschool and please let Mrs. Hudson know if you have any questions.

October Birthdays
Happy Birthday to Kullen Redford-Oct.4, Chase Johnson-Oct. 5, Jenna Garcia-Oct.5, Matthew Belcher-Oct.7, Mrs. Porter-Oct.7, Mrs. Colpo-Oct.8, Eiler Yancey-Oct.12, Andrew Coccaro-Oct.15, Emmalee Layton-Oct.18, Kyleigh Broomell-Oct.22, Halle Riley-Oct.25, Mrs. Lawton-Oct.25, Aiden Greer-Oct.26, Mrs. Parent-Oct.26, Karsten Stiles-Oct.31,

Congratulations
Charlie White (preschool) has a new sister Emerson born Sept. 3, Jai Spicer (playgroup) has a new brother Kyle born Sept.22 and Wiley Hormel (TMO) has a new sister Addie born Sept. 29.

For your thoughts and prayers
Aiden Yeatts - His grandfather (Mom’s Dad) died.

2009-10 Wish List
Gently used items wanted: toddler-size outdoor climbing toys, double stroller, laptop computers and printers for a computer lab we are hoping to set up
Coming in November - a LPC Weekday Preschool Wish List on Amazon with items the teachers would like to have for their classrooms.

Reminders
Tuition Payments
Monthly payments are due no later than the 1st of each month regardless of when that falls. Please use the payment envelope you were sent and make your payments on time so we are prepared to meet our financial obligations on time. Let Mrs. Amrhein know if your payment will be delayed.

Messages
Please leave messages on the Preschool answering machine which is checked regularly, send it in a note in your child’s folder which we check first thing every day, or in an email to the school email address which is checked regularly. Please do not give them verbally especially at arrival or dismissal. We are more focused on getting the students out of your cars and into their classrooms! All messages regarding Extended Hours are to be directed to Mrs. Spalding with a written note, on her phone (347-9762) or the preschool email. If you call the Preschool office and do not get an answer, please leave us a message. If it is an emergency call the church office 266-1231.

Arrival & Dismissal
Toddlers Morning Out arrival begins at 9am, not 8:45am. One of the TMO staff will unlock the ramp door at 9am to receive children. If you have a child in another program please drop that child off first. Dismissal is at 12n. One of the TMO staff will unlock the ramp door at 12n for parents to pick up their child. If you have a child in another program please pick up your toddler first. Please use the ramp entrance only unless you are dropping off late or picking up early, then use the church office entrance. 
Arrival begins at 8:45am for all other programs. In an effort to start our classes on time, parents arriving after 9am will go to the playground side, park and bring their child to the Preschool office and someone will take your child to their class. Playgroup and Preschool dismissal is 12n, Pre-K is 1pm and Kindergarten is 2pm. Parents picking up early will park on the playground side and come to the Preschool office and someone will go get their child.
Please make a double line when coming into the parking lot so no one is left waiting out on Hermitage Road and then alternate vehicles into one line when you round the curve. Please check to make sure the way is clear before pulling around a car and pulling away from the curb. Please consider moving your child to the driver’s side for pick up and drop off, this makes it much easier to get the child out and put him/her right onto the sidewalk. Thank you for keeping your child in their seat - buckled if necessary - until we take them out.

Box Tops & Cans
Check the products you buy and clip the “Boxtops for Education” coupon when you find one and send it in to us. To date we have earned enough “box tops money” to buy 4 steel tricycles at $100 each. This year we hope to add some scooters to our “fleet” with your contributions. Don’t toss that can (or any other aluminum!) Bag it and send it in and we will add it to our collection. The money earned goes into the maintenance fund. 

From the Church
Brown Bag Bible Study every Thursday at 12noon led by Pastor Dick. Bring a lunch and if you need childcare to attend please call the Preschool office and we’ll help with that. 
WOW Worship on Wednesday featuring contemporary music, fun activities, upbeat worship and dinner. Nothing to bring but yourself and your family. Nursery available for children under 3yrs. First WOW is October 14 6-7:30pm. Program topic is “Finding Common Ground”. 
Lamb’s Basket, the food pantry serving the Lakeside area needs volunteers to help with stocking and distributing weekdays 9:30am-1:15pm and with clean up on Saturdays 10-11:30am.
Please call Janet Jones (364-1841) to volunteer yourself, your family or a group you belong to that’s looking for a service project.

From the Director’s Desk:
What an opening we have had! Thank you for making it just the best! The picnic was wonderful and from all I could tell the children thoroughly enjoyed meeting Eager Beaver from Kamp Kreatures. We are hoping to have them back in January. We’ll let you know through the newsletter as plans develop! I was glad to see so many of our families had made attending Celebration Sunday a priority.

We are rolling and it feels really good! We are serving 92 children representing 79 families. Your children are getting into routine and now we need for YOU to do the same. It is imperative that you get into the routine of:
Reading the monthly newsletter as soon as it comes out. We are going to be diligent about getting the monthly newsletter online so it is available on the 1st. It will keep you up to date and informed, but the information is sometimes time sensitive. No one feels good when a child comes to school unaware or unprepared, especially the child. It is very discouraging when we have made every effort to keep parents informed to hear directly or indirectly “No one told me.” or “When did that happen?”. Please let the Preschool office know if you need a hard copy and we will send it home in your child’s folder. 
Checking your child’s folder after each day they attend, returning what needs to be returned, responding to what needs to be responded to or just celebrating something your child has done. There will the days when you will find nothing, but that day you decide to put it off until later and then forget will be the very day you miss something important.

Classroom Updates
This section will regularly feature a snippet from your child’s teacher’s monthly updates that are featured on our parent discussion forum. Look out for a welcome email from your child’s teacher in the upcoming week. You will be prompted to register at that time. The Discussion Forum is here to allow parents more access to their child’s preschool day. It is open to parents and family members of currently enrolled students only.

Toddler Morning Out: Our first week of school has been a very active one.  The children have been spending a lot of time running and playing outside.  We have quickly learned that our boys are truly boys, loving their dump trucks and sand, and our girls have been enjoying chasing bubbles and spending time in the playhouses on the playground. ...read more.

Playgroup:
Mrs. Bobbie’s Class - Our theme this week was Apples. We talked about the colors of apples (red, yellow and green) and the parts of an apple (skin, core, seeds and stem). We even cut open an apple and stamped it onto paper. We read the big book “Apples, Apples”. ...read more
Mrs. Jackie’s Class - This has been a great week for the boys and girls!  We had so much fun talking about “Apples!”.  We learned all of the different things you could make with apples! Yummy!  We also started our Creative Movement with Ms. Mandy and Music with Mrs. Gill this week!  The children really enjoyed that! ...read more.

Preschool:
Mrs. Hudson’s Class - We have been singing songs about apples and acorns and we have also done some art work with glitter, painting with chocolate pudding and more apple painting pictures.  The Bookmobile came on Monday and they all enjoyed hearing Ms. Carolyn read three stories....read more
Mrs. Johnson’s Class - During Circle Time, we read books about starting school and about apples.  Some of the books were “Clifford’s First School Day”, “Apple Trouble”, and “Ten Apples Up On Top”.  I also started our “Leader of the Day” program this week....read more.

Pre-K:
Mrs. Oliver’s Class - Our theme this week was “All About Me.” The children had their pictures taken for a thumbprint project and we used magnifiers to look at our fingerprints and talked about how everyone’s is different because there’s no one exactly like them.  Everyone liked the magnifiers, and we took turns making each other laugh with our “big faces.”:) ...read more.
Mrs. Parent’s Class - Coming up this week we will start our alphabet review with the letter “A”. This will include some apple activities, apple snacks, and apple art. Our animal this week is an Anteater. We hope that introducing animals that maybe the children haven’t heard much about, will be more fun and interesting. On your calendars that will be coming home, we will have the name of the “Animal of the Week”. ...read more.
Mrs. Riley’s Class - We are studying the letter “A” and focusing on our theme of Apples.  Today we were anteaters and went on an ant hunt around our classroom.  The children had a blast, and were very helpful when some students were having trouble finding the ants. ...read more.

Kindergarten: What a busy and colorful week we had.  We spent the week learning color words and matching colors.  We have gone over each of the eight basic colors.  We read the book “The Crayon Box That Talked”.  We also read “Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?” using stick puppets and “Mouse Paint” using flannel board puppets.  We illustrated the poem “Colors” for our Poetry Notebooks.  We also started a color booklet and our first page was the color red.  We used red paper and cut out shapes to make “Clifford, The Big Red Dog”.  We will continue to work on this booklet over the next few days. ...read more.

Music with Mrs Gill: Our new music room is on its way to completion.  I am really looking forward to settling in.  In the meantime, I am going to each classroom to sing with all the children—from the Toddler Morning Out program to the Kindergarten.  Right now we are singing some old familiar songs.  We will be singing songs of Fall in the coming weeks. ...read more.

Dance with Ms. Mandy: Coming soon!

We would love to hear your comments and suggestions!

Highlights This Month