September 2026
Welcome!
The newsletters are organized as follows: “whole school” overviews, “pre-school” news, “pre-kindergarten” news, “coming-up”, “housekeeping”, and a “child-development” ditty. The purposes of the newsletter are to keep you informed of class happenings, upcoming events, and connected to our classroom! Enjoy!
Whole School News:
The first weeks of school have been very exciting! Everyone is working hard transitioning from Home Mode to School Mode. It’s only been the first three weeks, and already these young people have shared who they are, and how they fit into their families via the “family trees”. It has been fun to watch the Harmony tree change as every student has added his or her contribution! They are very proud of their families; and are discovering that we all have one, and they all look different!
Our new, younger “preschoolers” are taking everything in, getting used to the daily schedule, and making huge strides socially and emotionally right now! Our older “preschoolers” are very excited and have amazing confidence this year.
Small group times are in full swing. The children are learning how to be “great students”. I am most impressed with how quickly our little community is growing together; we have so much wonderfulness to work with! Our nature walks have given us perfect opportunities to share common experiences, talk while walking, listen to stories, observe the changes autumn is making, pet the horses, and listen for different sounds. Our nature walks are magical. . . . Snack-time is already a very social time! The children are working hard unpacking their belongings, organizing their things, and picking up after themselves.
Our “social” lessons this month, are reciprocal language, eye contact, and table manners; ie. taking a bite of food, chewing with CLOSED mouths, and not talking with food in the mouth. It is important for children to grow the positive social skill of answering questions, verbally and with eye contact, when another is talking with them. It is not too early to teach these little ones table manners, which will serve them well . . . f o r e v e r. We are practicing at school!
Lastly, we are constantly promoting self-help skills; the children are putting their own coats inside their backpacks when they arrive, and we are teaching them how to put them on via the coat trick,
(here’s the coat trick: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUHmveYYOrw)
It is a tremendous confidence booster when a child can do for themselves. The organized classroom environment enables the children to achieve self-sufficiency as our expectations are clearly and repeatedly communicated, their coat hooks are labeled and easily reached, the bins are all labeled with pictures, the trash cans are easily accessible, and the day follows a familiar flow.
We are enjoying our time with your children!! Our days fly by!! All my best, Miss Holly
One more thing. . . please be sure to check your Brightwheel app for messages and follow Harmony on Instagram. . . we message daily. . and post often, to give you a glimpse of our day and hopefully spark some great conversation from your student!! https://www.instagram.com/harmonyfamilypreschool/
Preschool News: by Miss Lori
We are off to an amazing start! The Harmony Students are arriving on time and prepared for a great day at school! Your children arrive at school and begin with their morning work. They unpack their snacks, placing them in our classroom snack box, and hang up their backpacks and coats in their assigned cubby.
Our small group time begins as soon as everyone is unpacked. For the first two weeks of school the preschoolers introduced themselves one at a time to their friends and shared special information about themselves. During our small group time your children are learning use the Two Hand Rule, sing Seven Days of the Week, building shapes with blocks, and picking their daily job. They are learning that our September Circle has curved lines and is the color Red. Our number for September is 1.
Small group time is followed by free choice time where the preschoolers move about our classroom freely making choices that interest them. Within this block of time we have the children use the bathroom and wash their hands and get ready for snack time.
Free choice time ends with bell ringing and clean up time by all students. We then gather in the PreK classroom for God Bless America and end with a story.
Our day ends with a nature walk and/or time on the playground. Our classes are busy and very purposeful. Throughout our time with your children, we emphasize Harmony's words of wisdom "When you come to school, remember to be KIND, RESPECTFUL, SAFE, A FIRST TIME LISTENER AND AN OPTIMIST". Your children are doing an amazing job navigating their new surroundings and transitioning through their daily activities. Feel proud of your children, we certainly do!
Miss Lori
Pre-K News:
Our new Pre-Kers are off to a fabulous start! I am so impressed with how quickly they have adjusted to being the "big kids" in school! They are all showing me "great student" behavior, (being kind, respectful, safe, a first time listening optimist. . . and we’ve added HARD WORKER!).
The children have done a great job of arriving at school cheerfully, unpacking their belongings independently and start their day looking for 20 RED September circles. It is very helpful to have the children arrive on time as we do begin with structured time right away. The morning drop off is 8:30, the afternoon drop off is 12:15.
We start our day searching for 20 red September circles. . followed by name practice, then a workout (air spuats, jumping jacks, yoga,, foot taps, side tap hops, split jumps, cross country skiiing!!!). . . onto, calendar work, number practice, and letter work with an estimating jar/mystery can finisher!
Please, please, please make the Harmony calendar available to your little one, and quickly practice using it every day. . . . this little time spent will support your students classroom learning tremendously. The notion of “time” is a very big concept to break down and practice. . . a little bit. . . every day. Our preK meeting sounds like a lot, but the kids are doing an excellent job following along and using "the two hand rule" to answer questions. (we are pretty sweaty by the end of our meeting)
We have a Pre-K alphabet tray that holds various items beginning with the letter of the week. We have used it for the letters A, B, C, and D this month. We spend an entire week on one letter. We learn about the lines needed to make each letter and what sound each letter makes.
We also have a “Question of the Week”. . . . I like to use the “letter of the week” in the question. Its pretty self-explanatory, but the children need to find their name, vote, and then we tally up the numbers and compare. . . it’s a fun activity while learning simple sight words ( DO, YOU, LIKE, YES & NO) as well as some awesome math concepts such as “less than”, “more than”, predicting and adding.
Lastly, this is a song the pre-k children will start learning next month. It is super helpful, if it is available for them to hear it at home whenever possible:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SE-ljfAmZis&list=RDSE-ljfAmZis&start_radio=1
I am proud of how well the Pre-Kindergarten children have done this month. They are a lovely little group, I am enjoying them so much!
Miss Holly & Miss Lili
Coming Up:
As the season changes to Autumn, we’ll point out its effects on the trees. The first half of October our curriculum is about fire safety and fire fighters; the last two weeks, Halloween safety! Please note the Halloween dress up party days on the October calendar!!! OCTOBER 29th and 30th.
The teachers and I have been observing and absorbing the classroom activities; and taking time to find common ground and connect with each little person.
Over time, we will get to know your children and prepare a formal observation report in both January and May. We look at each Childs interrelated areas of development: social, emotional, physical, and cognitive. The goal is to assess each individual child and utilize parts of the curriculum that will specifically help that child grow their confidence and self-esteem. Each child is unique, and therefore experiences an individual development process. Children can be very much ahead of their chronological age in one area of development, but may be lagging in another. To nurture a child into a well rounded and balanced individual, it is especially important for caregivers to support the whole child; working with the Childs strengths and mindfully supporting/challenging any weaknesses. It is also significant to mention that even though the child development process is unique to each and every person, it is very much sequential with an ebb and flow type characteristic. There is more information regarding child development in the “child ditty” portion of this and future newsletters.
OPEN HOUSE! Wednesday, October 21st! This is an afternoon/evening where your student will lead you around their classrooms! We will give you a quick scavenger hunt to go on, together with your student. It’s a QUICK event, but will give you a great sense of how your youngster is passing their time while at school. A sign up genius is available with 12 slots for each time. . . to manage traffic flow. (it will be VERY helpful if each family arrived in one car to facilitate parking)
House Keeping
-Halloween Party Dress Up Days: THURSDAY OCTOBER 29thAND FRIDAY OCTOBER 30TH. Easy to put on costumes that offer full mobility are best, the children will be navigating stairs while in their costumes; please no costume accessories that are easily lost and or broken at school.
-Thank you! For the generous donations of paper towels and hand soap!!! We use up a tremendous amount of paper towels and hand soap, it is greatly appreciated when these items are donated. Thank you!!!!
- NUT-FREE, DAIRY FREE, SESAME FREE, CHICKPEA-FREE, AVOCADO FREE & STRAWBERRY FREE
Please triple check the ingredient list of your child’s snack!! Please update anyone who may be preparing your little ones snack of our food safety restrictions. Thank you for your support in keeping our population safe! Please be mindful DAIRY includes yogurt and cheese.
-Birthday Books!! We will acknowledge each child’s birthday with a song at circle meeting and a book choice from the “Birthday Book Box”.
-Communication: Please UPDATE your Brightwheel APP and add Harmonypreschool.org to your “favorites” list for easy access. These are the primary method of school-to-home communication. I send emails as infrequently, as possible; but like to remind you of upcoming events/new website postings via BRIGHTWHEEL.
-Labeling: It is MOST helpful if all snack bags, lunch boxes and backpacks are labeled on the OUTSIDE of the container for easy identifying!! It’s a huge time saver and truly helps out with classroom organization. Also please remember to label your child’s coat, hat, and everything else they may bring to school.
-KEEP UP THE GREAT WORKon pick up and drop off! Please be sure to use up the outside and inside of the circle drive when pulling in. . . I’m seeing people stop in the “no mans part” of the driveway when the whole outside part of the circle is free. . . when people stop in the narrow part of the drive the others pulling up behind have no-where to go and it creates a bottle neck. Please share this information with the Nanas, Papas, Mimi’s, aunts, nannys and babysitters.
If you find yourself arriving late, please yield to the cars exiting the driveway while you wait on Main Street, or pull to the fenced side at the end of the driveway and please let the others pass. Thank you for your effort. If you need to pick up your child during school, and find the door locked; please ring both door bells as we very rarely hear door knockers. If you call the school, and we don’t answer, please don’t fret. . . we never interrupt our play to answer the phone, but will check for messages as soon as we are free. The school number is 781-871-5156
-ABSENCES: Please leave me a message via brightwheel
Thank you!
-BACKPACKS: Reminding you to check the backpack fairly often for art and work sent home.
-Reminder: tuition is due on the first of the PRIOR month! I greatly appreciate your attention here, as book-keeping is time consuming and a drag.
Child Development Ditty 101:
I typically add a child development ditty to the end of each newsletter.
My hope is that you’ll find the information helpful or at least get a chuckle from it.
Here, I’ll start the year by talking about the interrelatedness of the 5 primary areas, and the PROCESS, of development. Each child grows at their own unique pace, socially, emotionally, cognitively, and physically (and we break a child’s physical self into two parts gross motor development (large muscle groups) and fine motor development (small muscle groups, typically just the hands). Children, in general, meet up at the same “developmental” place, around the third grade.
There are many contributing factors as to how/why a child develops, the primary ones being: heredity, environment, general health, opportunity, and nutrition. I like to mention expectations as a developmental factor as well. I find it interesting to think about weather or not we are expecting enough or possibly too much from our children socially, emotionally, physically, and cognitively as they age. . . . and how we have to incrementally and continually raise our expectations over time.
Each “growing up” process is unique. No child experiences the same rate and path of development; therefore there is a large range of TYPICAL chronological benchmarks. All areas of development are important. Children are going to have strengths and weaknesses; and both strengths and weaknesses need to be supported. I’ll provide more information on each area of development as the year progresses; my aim here is to communicate that all areas of development are both inter-related, important, and follow a sequential process (however, childhood is when development occurs most rapidly, and where we establish our life habits)
I’ll also attach a link from the Harvard School of Public Health, for their description of “kids healthy eating plate”; (minimizing/eliminating “processed” food, antibiotics, and pesticides from our childrens diets will benefit their health today, tomorrow, and forever)
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/kids-healthy-eating-plate/
and another interesting read on ways sugar effects children: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/08/17/4-shocking-ways-sugar-affects-your-kids-health.html
aaaannnndddd lastly, here’s two breakfast recipies. . . I LOVE “egg muffins”, I usually hide some baby spinach in these too.. . . (I skip the spices detailed here and my kids used to eat these 3, 4, 5 muffins at a time. . . . ) These cook up nicely on Sundays, and keep in the fridge for a few days, it’s a quick protein/fat packed breakfast for those growing bodies. Good luck!
https://www.healthcorps.org/sausage-egg-muffin-cups/
The second recipe is protein waffles, I double this and freeze in batches of 2-3 so we can pop them in the toaster to heat up, add lots of almond butter, the apple chutney, and a tiny bit of natural maple syrup, even my picky nephews scarf these down. . . these waffles are much more nutrient dense than anything you could buy in a box.