Spring started out with guessing whether the groundhog would see his shadow or not. We encouraged the children to vote on whether or not we were going to have six more weeks of winter and created a graph to display our data! Those who said we were going to have an...
The Private Industry Council of Westmoreland / Fayette Inc. (PIC) is celebrating 40 years of offering youth programs in Westmoreland/Fayette counties. To celebrate this milestone, PIC is welcoming all youth to their Youth Open House events to learn more about all PIC...
For the past two years, Head Start / Early Head Start have been participating in a Local March for Babies fundraising walk. Each year our donations to the March of Dimes have grown. This year, as in the past two years, we will meet at Hutchinson Park on Saturday,...
Early Head Start Childcare Partnership (EHS-CCP) is a center-based program for infants and toddlers. EHS CCP partners with eligible daycares to create EHS CCP infant /toddlers’ rooms within the daycare. But how is this different from the current head start and Pre k...
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Head Start / Early Head Start FAQs The Private Industry Council discusses frequently asked questions for Head Start and Early Head Start students. Private Industry Council operates the Head Start / Early Head Start program for Beaver and Fayette Counties in the...
My original intent for this article was to provide parents with information on how to prepare their preschool children for school. You know, practices like establish routines, talks with your children about what the day will look like, and validating their feelings and providing reassurance.
As a native of Pittsburgh, I grew up hearing the wise Mr. Rogers impart his wisdom on how children learn, how to be a good neighbor and how to be a good person. So naturally I visited the Fred Rogers Institute website (formerly the Fred Rogers Center for Early Learning and Children’s Media). The first thing that caught my attention was Fred Roger’s Six Basic Necessities of Learning. These six necessities are quite simple but extremely important. They are:
Immediately I began to reflect on my own experiencing raising a child and began to ask myself if I, as my child’s first and primary teacher, promote and provide these basic necessities of learning with my young son. Did I make him feel valued and protected? Did I listen intently to his stories and ask questions? Did I ensure there were caring adults around him he could count on for support and encouragement? Did I foster his curiosity and encourage him to explore new things while keeping him safe? Did I slow down when we were in a hurry to allow him to appreciate new things and ask questions? Did I provide opportunities to play, create, find solutions? Did I allow quite time? Did I provide him opportunities to help?
Although I feel confident I did many of the things above, I can’t help but wonder if I could have or should have done more to promote school readiness and success not only when he started pre-school or kindergarten, but throughout his entire school career.
For more information on Mr. Roger’s Six Basic Necessities of Learning go to https://www.fredrogersinstitute.org.
Submitted by:
Tami Ozegovich, Head Start/Early Head Start Director, Beaver County
724-836-2600