Read - A- Long, Sing - A -Long… Kvell with me
Jaclyn Zeccola, PhD, Clinical Director
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On Sunday February 22, a day when the Cheerful Helpers building is generally quiet and
empty, the community filled it with friendship, connection and reunion. The Read - a- Long, Sing - a - Long event is a Cheerful Helpers staple. It’s an event that happened for many years
pre-covid. It involves a very simple premise: alumni families and current families gather together. They read books together and individually, decorate cookies and sing songs.
Simple, easy, and a nice way to spend an afternoon.
As with many Cheerful Helpers' activities, the simplicity and consistency of the frame allowed for a beautiful and magical event. Alumni and current students did connect, and
alumni students connected with one another. At one point the rug area was filled with Cheerful teens who were reading books from their childhoods, offering commentary, and mostly, offering each other their attention. It’s hard to describe how awesome it felt
to bear witness to these teens' ease with dropping back into the community.
Cookie decorating came next, but what couldn’t be expected was the Cheerful graduate who brought his guitar and sang songs throughout the last hour. He sang songs with others, sang songs by himself, and finally helped me, or I should say, allowed me to join
him in leading everyone in a few final songs before the end of the afternoon.
Nobody wanted to leave. Something felt held in our space that doesn’t get to be expressed in many, if any, other spaces. Parents sat back and enjoyed their kids, and the kids enjoyed each other. It was heart filling, and so moving to be present for such a
simple and immensely meaningful event.
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Rebeca's Class - is learning about sound-letter correspondence for the letters O, P, Q (beginning/middle/end sounds). Students are focusing on numbers 13 and 14 and learning how to measure time with the clock. Children are creating their name cards using shapes to draw. Children are putting together Monday Business and Picture & Story Books.
Maria’s Class - is learning about repeated addition and using this skill to make an array city. In literacy, students are learning words with CH, CK and TH sounds. In recognition of Spring, students are doing a bamboo plant experiment!
First Grade - is reading books and identifying the beginning, middle and end of stories.
A small sample of books we read this month:
* Go Dog Go
* I Broke My Trunk
* I Was So Mad
* Courage
* Double Dip Feelings
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| The Role of the
Everyday Assistant
Tatiana Padovan, LMFT, Child and Family Therapist
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In a classroom full of young children, you quickly learn that the phrase “blood, sweat, and tears” can apply to an ordinary school day, in the most kid-sized ways possible.
I’ve been an Everyday Assistant for the past two years, and during that time I’ve had the privilege of building deeply meaningful relationships with the children in our program. Our days
are full of movement and emotion, playing outside until sweaty, loose teeth proudly shown off, the occasional scraped knee that needs a bandage, and sometimes tears when a feeling grows a little too big to hold alone. It’s a lot of life packed into a single school day. These small, very human moments are where connection begins.
My role in the classroom is to support the teacher, guide and train new interns, and help parents as their children transition into school. Because interns rotate and aren’t always present every day, I often become a steady thread in the classroom. I help carry the rhythm of the day and the small but important stories of the children from one moment to the next. Through co-narration and reflection, I share what I observe with interns so they can better understand what
might be happening beneath the surface of a child’s behavior.
Within our classroom community we try to create something both simple and
meaningful, a space where feelings are safe. Many of the children we work with experience emotions in big ways and are still learning the language to express them. Sometimes my role is
simply to lend those words, to gently name frustration, excitement, disappointment, or pride until
the children begin to recognize those feelings for themselves.
Our classroom often feels like a small family. Not because everything is seamless, but because we return again and again to something meaningful together: expressing feelings openly,
repairing when things get hard, and learning how to move forward with care. It’s healing, uplifting work, and I feel lucky to be part of it five days a week.
And somewhere between the loose teeth, playground sprints, and the tears that eventually pass, I’m reminded that it’s in these small moments, messy, honest, and human where the real
work really begins. After two years, I can say that “blood, sweat, and tears” is not just a phrase of investment around here, it’s simply part of what it means to grow, to learn, and to care for one another.
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In this month's video, Janet asks Jaclyn to share how we are using dyadic play therapy to support our children and their parents. |
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