May News and Notes

Dear Leila Day Families:

It seems incredible but there are only four and half weeks left in the school year. It has been a wonderful year and the month of May has been no different. We reached our $50,000 goal in the Great Give. We started off the month with our Maypole/Herbal Mascot Celebration and haven't stopped since. The garden beds are gorgeous; the mud kitchens are in full effect; we have frog and newt eggs growing in our classrooms; we rescued a baby opossum, affectionately named Leila; children our vying with the professional birders over in East Rock Park on various inquiry projects; we are learning about and falling in love with the Mill River; we have front row seats as the great pollinator dance unfolds; insect investigations abound; the woods glimmer and shine with every imaginable shade of green; and the children, the "root children," the new creators and meaning makers, shape and reshape the mud and the clay of the earth. We are doing a great job in helping children learn about and connect with the natural world.

I asked the teachers, as they write their family letters and prepare for their end of the year conferences with you, to review and explore all the work they have done with your children in each of the six competencies (or habitudes to use John Dewey's word). These competencies represent our best understanding of human potential, of human possibility: how to be open and attentive to the world, to each other, and to everything in our own hearts that can be done and that makes life worth living. I would ask you to reflect on your own understanding of human potential and possibility in relation to your own children. What do you want for them in a school, here at Leila Day? What do you want for them in terms of their growth, learning, education, and wellbeing?

I am so impressed by how far all the children have come in using multiple sign systems to express themselves, communicate with others, and learn about the world. I am utterly convinced that we are providing the strongest possible foundations for children to embrace print literacy and become successful readers and writers. And beyond that, I see children using language (and other sign systems) to interact constructively and positively with each other and their communities. I see them using "the 100 languages" of childhood to read the word and the world. I see them engaging with the cultural materials and messages that they are confronted with, and becoming active players in making meaning and rewriting culture. But in some ways this is all too abstract. I see the children, each child, develop the confidence, the independence, and the care to embrace all of life's possibilities. "They'll learn much more than I'll ever know."

Finally, we are coming to the end of teacher appreciation week, but I can't say enough about the teachers who are at the beating heart of Leila Day. I am in awe of them. I hope we can use this first year of my leadership to make a commitment, a covenant, of respect and appreciation for one another. I have grand visions of how we can make Leila Day a center of joyful teaching and learning. Ultimately, it is up to all of us to bring an attitude of joyful appreciation and care to each other if we are to turn those visions into reality.

Charlie