National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week

In the US this week it is National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week.

This information is from the California Poison Control System.

Children are most commonly exposed to lead by eating paint chips or dirt that is contaminated with lead.

“Lead poisoning is an important cause of learning disabilities, anemia, as well as growth problems, and children exposed to lead may have attention and aggression problems.” - Dr. Richard Geller, Executive Medical Director for the CPCS. 

To prevent lead poisoning, children should wash their hands frequently, wash their toys often and eat a diet high in iron and calcium.  
Children who are undernourished can absorb more lead into their bodies than children with well balanced diets.  

1. Make sure your children do not chew on painted surfaces, such as toys or window sills.
2. Children's necklaces and bracelets, adult watches, as well as religious jewelry from Mexico, have been found to contain lead.
3. Keys frequently have small amounts of lead in them – do not let babies play with or teethe on your keychain..
4. Folk medicines (especially home remedies) imported from another country also contain lead. These include: pay-loo-ah (fever and rash treatment); azarcon (also called Maria Luisa, Liga, Alarzon, Greta, Coral and Rueda); Asian folk remedies, including Ghasard, Bali Goli and Kandu; and Middle Eastern folk remedies, including farouk and bint al zahab.

Customizeable Color Sheet Printables

I was just introduced to http://twistynoodle.com/ , a website with free printable worksheets and 

coloring pages for Early Years.

You can customize the text of the coloring sheet and select different fonts. 

One of the choices is D'Nealian, which is a good begining handwriting font.

I am having fun with this!

Peace One/International Day Coming Up!

We would like to encourage your child to wear his/her national dress for this special Peace One/International Day next Tuesday morning, September 21st.

For the afternoon, however, please be sure that your child has his/her VIS sport t-shirt available for the soccer tournament, as they will be divided into house teams.

This day will be big and extremely 'out of routine' for our little ones. Should you have the chance to make yourself available to EY for that day, we encourage you to stay; particularly for the break, international lunch, and soccer tournament. Yes! our little one are part of the BIG game and there will be lots of great photo opportunities throughout the day.

You can find more details about this special day's event in last week's Dragon Tales.

Our Goodbye Songs

Every afternoon we sing a series of goodbye songs to end the school day. We're sure you may have heard the odd melody being hummed in the back of the car :) One of the songs is call 'Goodbye My Friends Goodbye'. We try to make sure we have included every child's language throughout the week; however, we are still missing a few vocabulary. Please help us by posting or emailing the words for "goodbye" and "my friends" in your mother-tongue, preferably with the phonetic pronunciation for us :)

Thank you in advance!

Online Resources For Preschool Education

On Open Night, I mentioned having several recommended websites with free educational resources for Early Years students. 
Here are a few of my favorites, and the favorites of other EY teachers I met in Singapore during a recent professional development conference.


http://www.starfall.com - preschool appropriate early literacy games. The "ABC's" section is best for EY learners. 


http://www.enchantedlearning.com/Home.html - free printables and craft ideas on a variety of searchable topics. You can print these for free with a small ad at the bottom of the page, or pay a yearly membership fee to print without the add.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks1bitesize/ - online maths and literacy games, best for ages 5 and 6.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/alphablocks/ - activities based on BBC Alphablocks.


http://www.pbskids.org - online games based on favorite TV characters like Calliou, Fireman Sam, Elmo, and Curious George.

Playdough

Thank you all for helping Early Years keep a healthy and constant fresh supply of play dough. Please be sure to mark your calendars with your personal play dough delivery time.

Here is the recipe:

It is important that the dough is thoroughly cooked to avoid it going moldy too soon. Also be very meticulous about the measurements of the ingredients, especially if you are doubling the amount! don't forget to double the salt! - something that has happen too often to me :) Please be reminded that we need the play-dough for both classrooms, EY3 & 4 so you will need to the double amount.

A few tips:

• teach you home helpers how to make it :)
• add some essence such as mint, or orange :)
• be creative with the colouring - i.e. mix red and blue to make purple :)
• throw in some glitter :)
• use a blender to make the mixture!

FAQ's

What flour should be use?

Any! some people even use rice flour for children with gluten sensitivity; however, we do not have that problem in EY this year.

Where can I find cream of tartar, and food colouring?

I suggests any time you head to Tesco Lotus, you stock up on it from there. You will find it in the aisle with the backing items in the rack with food extracts, jello, and jams. Both cream of tartar and food colouring are in the same space.

Should I use a specific kind of oil?

No, no specific type, however it's best to choose something that do not have a strong smell. Sunflower oil is quite neutral, but the cheap palm oil works fine also. I wouldn't use olive oil, though.

At what point do I add the colour?

Add the food colouring to the blended mixture before cooking.

Hope this helps! Happy workout!

(the mixing gets tough towards the end and makes a good arm workout :)

In case you are wondering - this is cream of tartar :)

Show n' Tell is a great way for children to be exposed to presenting information as well as learning what it means to be a good audience. This has become a very popular moment of the day! Please encourage your child to participate by reminding them of their turn and choosing appropriate items to bring and present. Show n' tell is also a great opportunity for the children to bring in something related to the current unit of inquiry 'Who We Are'.