Bostwick Children’s Center
April Newsletter
Theme: Spring
Spring is such a special time of year! Plants are popping up from the ground, flowers are
blooming, and insects are crawling, flying and hopping everywhere. To honor this
special time of year, we will be planting seeds and waiting to see what happens. Will a
plant grow? How do we take care of it? What does it eat? We will also be using our
scientific minds to think about metamorphasis; the process for an insect or amphibian
changing from egg to larva then pupa and adult. We will be observing butterflies,
ladybugs and maybe even tadpoles.
There are so many educational benefits from talking about nature with children. Having
a garden or plants teaches children a variety of skills and can help establish a sense of
community. It promotes fine motor and large motor skills, responsibility, reasoning,
discovery, creativity and nutrition. Here at CKC Bostwick our relationships to plants is
limited to the layout of our environment, so this month we plan on expanding nature
experience at school. If there is anything you can think of to help foster this new
relationship like donating plants, seeds, dirt or child size tools the children would love it!
Ms. Brooke’s Maternity Leave
Ms. Brooke’s last day teaching
before her maternity leave will be
Friday April 17th. While she is
gone, we will have Ms. Melissa
working with the Zazzy Zebras in
her place. And we will have Ms.
Joanna here to help as well.
All of us here at Bostwick are
excited for Brooke and her
husband, and can’t wait to meet
her little guy. We will greatly miss
Ms. Brooke and look forward to
her return in the fall.
Parent Conferences
We will be offering parent teacher
conferences through the end of April.
Conferences for the Zazzy Zebras will
be 4/6-4/17.
Conferences for children in the Leaping
Lions or Funky Monkeys will be 4/205/1. The best way to set up a time is to
email April at:
[email protected]
Graduation: Save the Date
We will be having preschool graduation Friday, June
19th at 4pm for children who will be leaving Bostwick
to their new adventures in kindergarten. There will be a
ceremony followed by a family potluck. More
information will follow next month.
Drop-in fee increase:
As of April 1st our drop-in rates will be
increasing.
Half day drop-in fee: $45
Full day drop-in fee: $65
*Please remember that CKC has an
annual tuition increase; this year’s
increase will be 3% effective August 1.
Week of the Young Child
April 13-17th
Monday: Wear Purple Day
Tuesday: Share Day
Wednesday: Pajama &
Book Day
Thursday: Costume Day
Friday: Teddy Bear Picnic
Bostwick Children’s Center
Looking Back at March
In March the Zazzy Zebras finished the alphabet
mastering M, S, K & J! They got to do many activities
around these letters like making keys and kites,
drawing their own sunflowers and creating jellyfish.
Around our dinosaur theme we had so much fun!!!
We mixed up our own playdough that we used to
make dinosaur eggs as wells as rolling it out into
letters to spell our names. We painted wooden
dinosaur bones and put together a 3-D T-Rex. The
children got to make clay dinosaurs, dinosaur eggs to
crack open, and created a group volcano that we used
to do a volcanic eruption. A fun science activity we
did was predicting how long it would take for our
dinosaur egg to hatch. The children hypothesized the
time it would take and got to observe the process.
~Ms. Brooke
Spring Family Gathering was a success!!!
Over the past month the Funky Monkeys have been
talking a lot about dinosaurs. We learned about different
kinds of dinosaurs like the tyrannosaurus rex,
stegosaurus and triceratops. We also learned that some
dinosaurs ate meat and some ate plants and leaves. The
children heard that meat eating dinosaurs were called
carnivores, plant eaters were herbivores and some
dinosaurs ate both plants and meat and they were called
omnivores. The Funky Monkeys also did some fun art
projects. We made eggs and cracked them open, did
dinosaur foot prints with paint, painted with ice cubes
and did shaving cream art. We got to do a fun
experiment with an ice block, rock salt and liquid
watercolor. The children observed that the liquid
watercolor and salt melted the ice. ~Ms. Jennifer
The Leaping Lions really enjoyed
studying dinosaurs!!!! They learned
dinosaurs names, that dinosaurs are now
extinct and the various diets of different
dinosaurs (herbivore, omnivore and
carnivore). We discussed what dinosaur
was our favorite and what we would do
if we had a pet dinosaur; my favorite
response was, “Take a bath with it.” We
enjoyed painting dinosaurs, doing our
group dinosaur collage, making
dinosaur tracks and eggs out of
playdough, and dinosaur stencils. The
children and I also sang our “Enormous
Dinosaurs” song. You could often hear
them singing this song as they played
with the dinosaurs outside in the sensory
tables. ~Ms. Cami
This month has been so much fun with
our dinosaur theme for the children
and teachers. In the afternoons, the
children worked so hard on all of their
activities. One of the activities the
children were so proud of was their
Dino mask. The children took their
time coloring and putting detail into
their masks. They were so excited
when they were done and even more
excited when they got to wear their
mask! The children are starting to
take their time on their art work and
are sitting down for 5-15 minutes to
focus on an activity. One of my
favorite parts of this month was
being able to do my normal baby
routine and use a baby dino. The
children really enjoy the baby outline
and finding ways to put the baby to
sleep, but adding a dinosaur took it to
the next level for them. The children
found it hilarious and amazing that the
baby Goliath (a triceratops) had a hole
in his diaper for his tail. Along with a
new baby, we had a new option of a
bath for the baby. ~Ms. Melissa