A Balancing Act

What are the building blocks necessary to develop balance and coordination?

• Attention and concentration: The ability to maintain attention to a specific task for an extended period of time as the core strength is not challenged.
• Body Awareness: Knowing body parts and understanding the body’s movement in space in relation to other limbs and objects for negotiating the environment or ball and bike skills.
• Bilateral integration: Using two hands together with one hand leading: e.g. holding a tennis racquet with the non-dominant hand with the ‘helping’ non-dominant hand holding and stabilising only between hits.
• Crossing Mid-line: The ability to cross the imaginary line running from the child’s nose to pelvis that divides the body into left and right sides, which also influences hand dominance.
• Hand eye coordination: The ability to process information received from the eyes to control, guide and direct the hands in the performance of a given task such as handwriting or catching a ball.
• Hand Dominance: The consistent use of one (usually the same) hand for task performance which is necessary to allow refined skills to develop.
• Muscular strength: A muscles ability to exert force against resistance (e.g when climbing a tree to push or pull up).
• Muscular endurance: The ability of a singular muscle or group of muscles to exert force repeatedly against resistance to allow sustained physical task engagement.
• Self regulation: The ability to obtain, maintain and change alertness level appropriate for a task or situation which then allows better attention to the task.
• Postural Control: The ability to stabilize the trunk and neck to enable coordination of the limbs for controlled task performance.
• Body Awareness (Proprioception): The information that the brain receives from the muscles and joints to make us aware of body position and body movement which in turn allows skills to become ‘automatic’.
• Sensory processing: The accurate processing of sensory stimulation in the environment as well as in our own body for quick and physically appropriate responses to movement.
• Isolated movement: The ability to move an arm or leg while keeping the remainder of the body still needed for refined movement (e.g. throwing a ball on handed or swimming freestyle).

 Ways to play on the balance beam:

 1. Walk the balance beam without falling off.

2. Walk backwards on the balance beam

.

3. See how fast you can go the length of the balance beam.

4. Hop along the balance beam without falling.

5. See how far you can jump from a standing start on the balance beam.

6. Count the number of steps it takes to walk the balance beam.

7. Practice heel-to-toe steps on the balance beam.

8. Play follow the leader. 

9. Pretend you’re walking a tightrope way up high.

10. Stand on one leg like a flamingo.

Today, Preschool Two had fun practicing their balance on the balance beam as one of our indoor gross motor activities.  Some children put their hands out the side or even up to help them with their balance.  

Read Across America Day

 NEA's Read Across America is an annual reading motivation and awareness program that calls for every child in every community to celebrate reading on March 2, the birthday of beloved children's author Dr. Seuss.

The Purpose of Read Across America

Motivating children to read is an important factor in student achievement and creating lifelong successful readers. Research has shown that children who are motivated and spend more time reading do better in school.

Read Across America Sponsors

At the national level, the National Education Association sponsors and spearheads the program with support from more than 50 national nonprofit and association partners. Locally, everyone-from schools to libraries to community centers to churches to hospitals to bookstores-is invited to host local events to celebrate and promote children's reading.

Read Across America Partners

In addition to the 3.2 million elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty, education support professionals, school administrators, retired educators, and students preparing to become teachers who make up NEA membership, some 50 national organizations and associations give their support.

Our Pre-K One class celebrated by wearing a fun Dr Seuss hat and bringing books to share with the class.

Let's Play Outside!

Purpose of Outdoor Play

There are two fundamental reasons why outdoor play is critical for young children in our early childhood programs and schools. First, many of the developmental tasks that children must achieve—exploring, risk-taking, fine and gross motor development and the absorption of vast amounts of basic knowledge—can be most effectively learned through outdoor play. Second, our culture is taking outdoor play away from young children through excessive TV and computer use, unsafe neighborhoods, busy and tired parents, educational accountability, elimination of school recess, and academic standards that push more and more developmentally inappropriate academics into our early childhood programs, thus taking time away from play. The following sections (based on Wardle, 1996-2003) describe the main reasons why outdoor play is critical for the healthy development of young children.

Enjoyment of the Outdoors

Outdoor play is one of the things that characterize childhood. And as Lord Nuffield once said, the best preparation for adulthood is to have a full and enjoyable childhood. Thus childhood must include outdoor play. Children need opportunities to explore, experiment, manipulate, reconfigure, expand, influence, change, marvel, discover, practice, dam up, push their limits, yell, sing, and create. Some of our favorite childhood memories are outdoor activities. This is no accident.

Learning about the World

Outdoor play enables young children to learn lots and lots and lots of things about the world. How does ice feel and sound? Can sticks stand up in sand? How do plants grow? How does mud feel? Why do we slide down instead of up? How do I make my tricycle go faster? How does the overhang of the building create cool shade from the sun? What does a tomato smell and taste like? What does a chrysalis change into? Do butterflies have to learn to fly? Much of what a child learns outside can be learned in a variety of other ways, but learning it outside is particularly effective—and certainly more fun! In the outside playground children can learn math, science, ecology, gardening, ornithology, construction, farming, vocabulary, the seasons, the various times of the day, and all about the local weather. Not only do children learn lots of basic and fundamental information about how the world works in a very effective manner, they are more likely to remember what they learned because it was concrete and personally meaningful

  

Health and Wellness Coordinator Training

Yesterday all Academy Health and Wellness Coordinators joined at The Academy of Seaboard Lane for a taste test of new products and further training.  What a fun way to spend a Tuesday!  We appreciate a company who values continued education for each position in our company.  Our cooks got to explore new products, learn new recipes, review FDA guidelines and more!

Trixie the Triangle

This week, our preschool one class is learning all about triangles.  They read all about Trixie the Triangle and pointed out many objects in their classroom that were in the shape of a triangle. Then, they used their bodies along with balance to accomplish making Trixie the Triangle outside on the playground

Conscious Discipline Parent Workshop #1

Last night - WHAT A NIGHT!  We had an awesome time learning about two Conscious Discipline basics - the brain state model and connection.  Thank you to all parents who joined us for this special time together.  Don't forget we are hosting a FREE parent workshop every third Thursday of each month for the next seven months to learn more about our social/emotional curriculum Conscious Discipline!  Our next workshop opportunity is March 15th when we explore the skill of Composure.  Mark your calendar now!

Valentine's Day

We are having a fun and exciting Valentine's Day here at the Academy of Cool Springs.  We have spent the day doing fun activities, passing out our Valentine cards, and preparing for our parties.  We have taken the cutest pictures and made some cute gifts for our moms and dads too!

Making Chocolate Covered Strawberries

All of the goodies our friends brought to share!

Ready for the party with our gifts!

Such a sweetheart!

Toddler one enjoying their party!

Yum yum!