News & Views: October 23

Important Dates:

  • Wednesday, October 28: No school, Staff Development Day

  • Wednesday, October 28, 7:00 pm: Threes & Fours Curriculum Night (via Zoom)

  • Monday, November 2nd: Final tuition payments are due. Checks payable to Cobble Hill Playschool, please.

  • Tuesday, November 4th: Election Day (CHP is open.  Please vote!)

  • Wednesday, November 11th: No School, Veterans’ Day

School News & Announcements

  • Upcoming Holiday Travel: As we move closer to the holiday season, I’d like to share CHP’s policies on travel in light of the pandemic.  CHP's position on travel mirrors that of New York State.  If your family decides to travel over the holidays, and you travel to a state or country on New York's Restricted States list, you will be required to quarantine for 14 days upon return.  For example, if you travel to a restricted state over the Thanksgiving holiday and return to NYC on Sunday, November 29th, your family would need to quarantine until December 13th.  Your child could return to school on December 14th.  (CHP will close for holiday break on December 21st.)  Similarly, if you are planning on hosting guests from a state on New York's restricted states list, your guests must plan to quarantine for 14 days prior to visiting with you.  While we know the importance of getting together with friends and family, we must continue to be mindful of the circumstances of this pandemic, and unfortunately this year, travel carries with it additional precautions and restrictions.  We thank you for your continued diligence and care for our little school community!

  • Partner Programs: Pre-pandemic, CHP was delighted to begin partnering with local children’s organizations like Child’s Play NY and Chess at Three for after school and summer programming.  We can’t wait to get back to these partnerships when public health conditions allow.  

    • In the meantime, Child’s Play NY is arranging small, static “pod” classes that can meet outside or in someone’s home.  While we can’t host these in our space, as we used to, we are happy to share this great opportunity with our families: 

    • Custom In-Person Play Pods for CHP (outside venue or host in your home):

Create a custom class for your group of up to 5 kids.  Choose from a list of themes (like Magical Creatures, Frozen Adventures, or Superheroes on Stage) or tailor-make your own experience. Child's Play NY centers social-emotional skills and nurtures kids' imaginations. Their award-winning theater curriculum engages students in safe gross-motor play and creativity.  Visit their site to learn more about hosting and request a class: https://childsplayny.com/create/

  • Halloween at CHP: We love Halloween, however over the years we have found that the anticipation and excitement can be too much for the children.  As such, we do not allow costumes in school.  However, we will celebrate in many other fun ways!

  • Flu shots: Flu shots are mandatory for all children enrolled in preschool programs in New York City.  Shots must be administered before December 31st.  Proof of vaccination should be submitted to Stacy (stacy@cobblehillplayschool.com OR fax: (718) 243-0445).

  • Final tuition payments are due on November 2nd.  If you have any questions about the amount of your payment, please contact Stacy (stacy@cobblehillplayschool.com).  Thank you!

Notes From Our Classroom Teachers

  • Teachers’ Corner: Welcome to our newly created Teachers’ Corner!  Front and center in our Parent Portal (password: together), we’ve added a video music class with Mel and an article on Limit Setting by Sarah.  Enjoy and stay tuned for more to come.

  • Field Trips: All of our 3s and 4s classes visited our local pumpkin patch (aka Mazzone Hardware) this week.  Outside, masked, and distanced, the children got to have a little “regular” in their lives - a big thanks to Mazzone for helping to arrange our visits!

Community Engagement

  • Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Parent Committee: As some of you may know, this year at CHP we are taking the critically important step of examining our relationship with diversity, equity, and inclusion. Although already committed to doing this work, recent events in our country have moved this initiative to the top of our priority list here at CHP. It is our position that this work is absolutely vital to the education of young children and by not actively pursuing it we are, at best, not best serving our children and, at worst, contributing to systemic racism and inequity.  Behind the scenes, our staff has been engaging in this work by having open and lengthy conversations, reading and discussing pertinent books, building a resource library, and taking professional development courses around this topic. But we know this alone is not enough. In order to fully engage in this work, it's absolutely necessary to involve our entire community, inclusive of staff, students, and parents.  In that spirit, we are creating a parent committee that will be tasked with crafting a multi-year action plan to make CHP a more inclusive, diverse, and equitable place to learn and play. Although we are still in the planning process, we expect the committee to meet 1-2 times a month with additional meetings being on an as needed basis. Further commitments may arise as we develop and solidify our plan of action and/or as our parent community demonstrates their enthusiasm for this endeavor. The only qualification needed to join is a commitment to social justice, although we encourage those with experience in the following areas to partake: education, non-profits, community organizing, strategic planning, and marketing. At this time, we are seeking parents to volunteer for the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee. If you are interested in joining, or have any questions, please email me at kelsey@cobblehillplayschool.com. Once we have an idea of how many parents are interested in joining we will reach out to schedule our first zoom meeting.

  • Have friends or family looking for a great preschool?  Please send them our way!  Applications are currently being accepted for our 2021-21 school year.  We are hosting virtual tours of CHP via Zoom evenings and lunch hours throughout October and November.  Please have interested families contact Stacy (Stacy@cobblehillplayschool.com) to register.

  • You’ve got (e-)mail!  We’ve created Google Groups for each classroom this year, to help and encourage the process of getting in touch.  

Events Around Town

  • CHP favorite Dr. Laura Markham shares some tips on talking to your child about voting as well as celebrating a safe and healthy Halloween.

  • The CDC shares information about a safe and health Halloween including risk assessments of various activities.  Be safe!

Cobble Hill Playschool