Announcements: Week of September 28, 2012

-All Community Meeting 
Wednesday, October 3rd 6:30-8:00PM

This Wednesday evening will be an opportunity for us to come together -faculty, board members, administration, and parents to create intention and more understanding about the possibility of New Amsterdam moving towards building a first grade and beyond.  
We look very forward to sharing our thoughts and hearing from you.  We are expecting someone from each family to attend.

Please let Lisa know if you have any questions.  Lisa.bono@newamsterdamchildhood.org.

-Changes to Drop-Off and Pick-Up
Beginning Monday, October 1st

We will have a new and required sign in/sign out sheet for every child and every day.  When you arrive on Monday there will be a clip board for your class.  The parent or caregiver bringing your child will need to sign them in. At pick up every child will need to be signed out.  Each person picking up or dropping off your child will need to be listed and authorized by you. We will have extra authorization forms for you on Monday.  We hope to make this as easy as possible. Many thanks in advance for these extra steps.

-First Parent Study

Wednesday, October 3rd 9:00AM

Our first parent study morning will begin this Wed. Oct 3rd in the parent lounge - 9:00ish.

>> MORE

-Garden Update Meetings

Monday, October 1st 9:00AM
Wednesday, October 3rd 9:00AM

The Garden committee is hoping to see you for one of our first meetings. We will have two brief overviews (for 10-15 minutes) to discuss the season this Monday 10/1 and Wednesday 10/3. Please join us directly after drop off at 9AM. Please be sure to see the note from Shoshana Sebring.
>> MORE

-Weekly Article: What Is A Well-Balanced Child? 
by Nina Kaufelt, New Amsterdam Parent

"Here’s a discovery: children who struggle with learning and attention often have vestibular trouble—trouble with balance! Isn’t it something to find that the well-balanced child is, in fact, well-balanced?   (Note to parents: In adults, trouble with balance is associated with anxiety. Isn’t it something to discover that the composed and poised adult is, in fact, well-balanced?)" Be sure to read the full article on the blog,

>> MORE

News from the Craft Cooperative

Thank you for coming to crafting Thursdays! We hope you are enjoying it.  We would also like to invite anyone else from our community who might want to try their hand at something new! Please find a loose schedule of activities on the blog,
>> MORE

Garden News - First School-Wide Garden Work Day

Dear Parents, 

The Garden committee is hoping to see you for one of our first meetings. We will have two brief overviews (for 10-15 minutes) to discuss the season this Monday 10/1 and Wednesday 10/3. Please join us directly after drop off at 9AM. 

All of the school garden programs are run by the parents of the school. We need every parent's participation at the school in some shape, or form in one way or another and the garden is one of the main places. Our first concern is always our children's safety and the second is to help to enrich our children's experience in their time together outdoors. The seasonal changes at the garden are phenomenal, and the fact that our children get to enjoy it daily is wonderful, but it takes work to keep it up. The public community garden, El Jardin, runs one block long and half an avenue wide, and we need your help in continuing to shape it's cleanliness, plantings, and growth for our children, for our school events, and for the community at large.

Our first school-wide garden work morning will be on Saturday the 27th of October from 10:00-12:30, everyone is welcome. Please feel free to bring your lunch for a picnic in the meadow afterwards.

If you don't like gardening, we need help in many other areas!
1. Creating parent look/see program that scopes out the garden in the AM before teachers and children arrive
2. Planning school garden events
3. Helping with upcoming clothing swap to benefit the garden
4. Preparing for school garden work days by:
-Buying supplies
-Loading supplies
-Gardening
-Helping with childcare in meadow so others may work

Many thanks on behalf of the Garden Committee,

Shoshana Sebring

Parent Study - October 3rd

Dear Parents,

Our first parent study morning will begin this Wed. Oct 3rd in the parent lounge - 9:00ish.

For those of you who are new to New Amsterdam, this is a time when parents come together with a faculty member to take up reading articles, books and discussing Waldorf Early Childhood Education.  

There  is also a space made for questions in regards to child development, home life, rhythm etc..

For those returning families I look very forward to sharing this time with you again.  I find the work we do together to be a strong aspect of our community life and our growing together.

See you soon.

Lisa

News from the Craft Cooperative

Dear Craft Cooperative,

Thank you for coming to crafting Thursdays! We hope you are enjoying it.  We would also like to invite anyone else from our community who might want to try their hand at something new! 

Below please find a loose schedule of activities. 

Next Thursday: 

--shaping and stuffing our knitted squares into toy animals

--cutting felt and beginning Hand Sewing tutorial

By Mid October we will have a doll making demonstration! Our expert doll makers, Clarisse and Mayuka will be making dolls for the auction. We, the mere mortal crafters, will follow along, observing their steps and making our own small basic doll heads, with a fabric body (marionettes--or ornament angels). The skills we observe and begin to learn will be very helpful when we do our full doll making workshop this winter.

November

--we will finish up auction items, your choice sewing or knitting

--we will work on our sail boats, so we will get some lessons in woodworking!

And then the auction will be upon us!

Weekly Article: What Is A Well-Balanced Child? by Nina Kaufelt, New Amsterdam Parent

What Is A Well-Balanced Child?

A Note from Nina Kaufelt

Here’s a discovery: children who struggle with learning and attention often have vestibular trouble—trouble with balance! Isn’t it something to find that the well-balanced child is, in fact, well-balanced?   (Note to parents: In adults, trouble with balance is associated with anxiety. Isn’t it something to discover that the composed and poised adult is, in fact, well-balanced?)

Balance is maintained through three systems: the visual, vestibular, and biomechanical.  The eyes tell your brain a lot about where your body is.  (“Watch your step!”) The vestibular system uses proprioception,  the body’s way of telling the brain where the body is in space.  (Close your eyes and raise your hand; proprioreception tells you where your hand is.) The biomechanical system includes the ankles, knees, and hips. Responding to information from the brain (both visual and vestibular), these actors tweak your position to keep you upright.

Sally Goddard-Blythe has explained  the connection between balance and learning and offers a treatment.  Not long after conception, the healthy baby develops a series of primitive reflexes, many of which have been discovered and named. Those who know newborns know the Moro or “startle” reflex.  Scare the infant, and his arms fly up in a U-shape, as if saying, “Catch me!”  The sucking reflex is connected to the grasping reflex, as any nursing mother who has felt those little kneading fingers knows. Together, the reflexes have many purposes: turning in the womb to be born; safety; comfort; forming a foundation for more mature movements.

In time, most reflexes are then “integrated.”  They are no longer involuntary, but they do not entirely disappear. They can now be recruited as needed for controlled, voluntary movements directed by the brain.  In this phase, the body and brain establish a new kind of cooperation.

In some children, however, the primitive reflexes remain, and this can cause trouble.  Consider balance.  The presence of retained primitive reflexes affects all three systems responsible for this critical skill.  One also finds primitive reflexes in children with sensory issues (aural, visual, or tactile) and those with learning challenges.

The treatment is movement!  Trained therapists in the UK, Australia, Asia, Mexico, and (recently) in the US take school children through certain steps designed to integrate the primitive reflexes.  According to Steven Dubin, who teaches this program, children who practice these moves can benefit in all the realms where retained reflexes have caused them to stumble.  The right moves can enhance neurological development; soothe sensory distractions; and remedy learning-related issues, such as the visual tracking  necessary for reading, or the good posture necessary for good handwriting.

For more information:

The Well-Balanced Child by Sally Goddard-Blythe

www.SallyGoddardBlythe.co.uk

In 1996, Sally adapted and extended clinical research on reflexes to create therapeutic exercises for schools, especially for children with learning difficulties.  Thousands of teachers in the UK, Germany, The Netherlands, Hungary, and Poland have learned the program, which has also been independently studied. Two practitioners of this therapy in the New York Metro area are below.

Steven Dubin
performancediagnostics@gmail.com
973 653 6077

Paul Stadler 
otpt747@aol.com
347 247 6835

© Nina Kaufelt, March 2012