What an amazing day for all young children when Governor Tom Wolf comes to talk about the importance of supporting Early Childhood Education teacher education and making learning fun! Governor Wolf first visited with the Chipmunks classroom to make playdough before giving a press conference in the A...

Friends and Families Fall is full of fun, friends and family for the Rainbows. We often experience children announcing the arrival of their friends' parents at pick up. Rainbows even join in giving a "PIC push" to parents as they leave in the morning. Children are so happy to share about their...

We Are Out When you think of the word ‘out’ it can have both great and not so great connotations. “You’re out!” shouts the umpire at a baseball game, or “It was out of this world!” as you describe an amazing dessert. “I’m out,” as you end a work day, or “get out of here,” as you land tickets to your...

A sound study Rainbow teachers were confident that a sound study would engage the Rainbows since they amuse us with sounds that they themselves create as they play. We noticed they show awareness of the sounds of our PIC neighborhood and the sounds we hear from the preschool classroom above us. T he...

written by Rainbows Lead Teacher Joanne Browley Loose Parts, Provocations, Oh My! Completing a Reggio-inspired training recently has peeked my curiosity and professional hunger for something new and exciting. The training was called Loose Parts, Provocations, Oh My! and it triggered my own early...

Senses and Sensibility We know that our children learn about the world through their senses. The Rainbow teachers were excited to study the five senses as a way to build upon what our toddlers had already discovered in their young lives. We also planned to explore literacy and numeracy through books...

written by Lead Teacher Joanne Browley The Process is the Product On one of our breezy fall mornings, the Rainbows ran back and forth filling a bag full of leaves. We categorized them as small, medium, or large and named the various colors of brown, red, purple, green or yellow. Bringing the leaves...

The Wonder of Wheels At a recent morning meeting the Rainbows discussed taking a neighborhood walk to look for wheels.“But what type of wheels?” the teachers asked. One Rainbow said “the wheels go round and round,” recalling a very, very popular song in our classroom. So the question was asked again...

Transition Time Shows Growth Transitions into or out of a classroom have various effects on children, their parents, and their teachers. Anticipation, with undoubtedly a little anxiety exists as our new and soon-to-be two and three-year-olds move up to a toddler or preschool classroom. It is...

Reading Rainbows Books, books, books! While many of us don’t often have time to read for our own enjoyment, as teachers it is something we do everyday. As a toddler teacher, you frequently read the same book for what seems like a thousand times! While it may begin to feel tiresome, you know that it...