We have had a wonderful week of learning, and we are gearing up for a very exciting transition as we move into the final stages of our current study. Grab your umbrellas and lab coats—here is what’s happening in our classroom!

Next Week – Continue our Water Exploration and Celebrating the Unit

Next week, we dive into Exploration 4: Next Week: Water Exploration 4 and unit closure. In this final phase of our Creative Curriculum Water unit, we shift our focus from “how water changes” to “how water helps us.” We will be exploring the essential roles water plays in our lives, from keeping our bodies hydrated to helping our gardens grow. Our little scientists will be investigating how we use water for cleaning, cooking, and staying healthy through hands-on activities and meaningful classroom discussions.

To wrap up all this hard work, we will hold our Unit Celebration next Thursday, 4/23! We’d love to have you join us between 2-2:30 pm in the classroom for a special time for the students to show off everything they have discovered throughout the entire unit and teach you some of the things they’ve learned. We are so proud of their curiosity and can’t wait to celebrate their learning with you. Please also note that there will be no school for students on Friday, 4/25, due to a Teacher Work Day.

Welcoming Ms. Tia! 

We are thrilled to officially welcome Tia Hildebrandt as our long-term substitute ECIP! Tia will be joining our classroom for the remainder of the school year. Many of you may already recognize her from her time guest teaching in both preschool rooms.

A Letter from Tia:

“Hi Coronado community! My name is Tia Hildebrandt, and I am the long-term guest teacher ECIP for Ms. Annie’s classroom. You may have seen me around, as I am a frequent guest teacher in both preschool rooms. I am so excited to spend the rest of the school year with this class!

A little about me: I received my B.S. in Psychology and B.A. in Anthropology from Eckerd College and have spent the last 10 years working as a zookeeper at various zoos, sanctuaries, and animal rescues around the world. Most of my caregiving experience is with gorillas, orangutans, and chimpanzees, but I have also worked with large carnivores (lions, hyena, leopard). I am very interested in animal conservation and worked as the Vietnam Conservation Program Project Assistant during my time with the Denver Zoo. I have also served as a research assistant with Field Projects International and traveled to Peru to assist with the tracking and data collection of wild emperor and saddleback tamarins. My time with the Vervet Monkey Foundation allowed me to travel to South Africa and rehabilitate injured and abandoned baby vervet monkeys.

Fast forward to today- my days are spent subbing at schools and teaching dance around the community! I teach all different styles of dance, but hip hop is my favorite style! I spend my free time hiking, camping, and hanging out with my dog, Louie. I feel very fortunate to be part of the Coronado family and am excited to be working with such a wonderful class!”

End of the Year Assessments 

It’s hard to believe, but the end of the school year is just around the corner! To celebrate how much our little learners have grown, we will conduct one-on-one end-of-year assessments, which will be very similar to those we held at the beginning of the school year. These sessions are a wonderful way for us to check in on your child’s progress and see all the amazing milestones they’ve reached this year.

Because of these End of the Year Assessment Days, there will be no regular school on Friday, May 1st, or Monday, May 4th, to allow time for these individual testing sessions. We ask that you please sign up for one assessment slot per child on one of those two days using this Signup Genius link. 

When you arrive for your scheduled time, please bring your child to our external classroom door to sign them in. We also ask that you remain in the vicinity of the classroom during the assessment to ensure a seamless drop-off and pick-up process and to help us stay on time for all our families. We are so proud of our students and can’t wait to see how much they’ve blossomed!

Have a wonderful, relaxing weekend, and we will see you on Monday!

Warmly,

The Preschool Team