Step into 2022
It’s been SO COLD this month!! Believe us when we say we understand the impulse to stay under a warm blanket, sip hot cocoa, and play wordle until Spring.
BUT we are holding a 6 week step challenge for our teachers and we will tell you why!
While we are staying outside as much as possible to maintain a firm “fresh-air” defense against the Covid-19 pandemic, there are so many health benefits to keeping outside and getting consistent movement.
Getting daily sunlight is essential for people of any age. Sunlight boosts mood, helps with sleep, increases Vitamin-D production, and helps you sleep! Balanced and Barefoot author Angela Hanscom also goes into detail about how outdoor activity boosts strength, reduces anxiety, helps with attention issues, sensory issues, and behavioral issues.
Consistent daily activity nourishes nearly every system in your body. A study published in the journal Comprehensive Physiology found that 35 different chronic health conditions are accelerated by physical inactivity. They range from heart disease and stroke to depression and constipation.
1. You could strengthen your heart.
Someone who gets 10,000 steps a day will have a bigger stroke volume—how much blood the heart pumps per beat—compared with someone who gets 1,000 steps a day. “A larger stroke volume is a sign of greater aerobic capacity,” says John Thyfault, PhD, associate professor of physiology at Kansas University Medical School in Kansas City, Kansas. “Aerobic capacity is arguably the best predictor of mortality and disease risk.”
2. You could store less body fat.
Calories eaten by someone who gets 10,000 steps a day do not travel the same path when they’re consumed by an inactive person. Thyfault has performed studies that shows when someone who exercises regularly eats that food is used differently by the body to fuel key systems compared with an inactive person. In someone who is habitually physically inactive, however, those calories are more likely to be stored as fat or in the muscle or liver. Evidence shows that habitual exercisers are also better able to handle those inevitable periods of excess—splurges like Thanksgiving Day, for example—without gaining as much weight.
3. You could help stabilize your blood sugar.
“The person who gets 10,000 steps a day will have a much lower glucose and insulin response in their blood after a meal,” he says. “The inactive person will have a much bigger response. That surge of glucose and insulin after a meal is a predictor of who will develop diabetes down the road and also a predictor of cardiovascular disease risk.”
4. You could improve your brain's performance.
The ability to learn new tasks, grow new brain cells, and stave off cognitive decline are all aided by daily moderate exercise. A study in the journal Current Biology showed that just one bout of exercise enhanced the brain’s ability to reorganize, repair, and adapt to new situations. Aerobic exercise, such as walking, may also spur new cell growth in the hippocampus, the area of the brain that regulates emotion and memory, according to a study done on rats that was published in The Journal of Physiology.
5. You'll reinforce healthy habits.
There is one difference between a stepper and non-stepper that can’t be seen on a glucose monitor, brain scan, or electron microscope: strength of will. Small successes build upon themselves. If someone got 10,000 steps yesterday and the day before, they are more likely to hit that mark again the following day.
“The whole 10,000 steps model is based upon making movement part of a normal routine where it wasn’t there before. It facilitates behavioral change,” says Brian Richardson, MS, NASM-PES, co-owner of Dynamic Fitness in Murrieta, CA, and associate professor of exercise physiology at nearby PGCC junior college. “When it comes to weight loss, behavioral change is dependent upon creating habits.”
We are hoping that in the next six weeks, along with providing healthy competition and fabulous prizes, we help our teachers develop and maintain lifelong habits that will keep them healthy and happy for years to come! We invite you to join us. If this is something you’d like to do SCHOOL-WIDE, let us know in the comments! We would love to hear from you!
Your CG Family.
"I met a Pediatrician in the woods..."
Hello all! Ms. LJ here. We have been talking so much about kindergarten readiness here, both as discussions in our blog and in our kindergarten planning meetings. For many of us it is a passion project, a calling to find a way to reintegrate the joy of childhood with the delight of curiosity, of hunting for answers in this beautiful world of ours.
Learning IS a joy that fuels the fires of our existence. Our children are subjected to the fears of failure early, of “falling behind” or being measured against their peers with a single yard stick and being found wanting. These anxieties become inextricably linked to education as they get older, convincing them that it is something they have to endure, rather than tools given and honed to become our best selves.
Why? It is our very ambitious belief that it is because we have cut off curriculum from play. Particularly in the American education system for young children we have turned away from the most natural, efficient source of teaching.
BACK TO MY ORIGINAL POINT: I MET A PEDIATRICIAN IN THE WOODS…
On Friday morning last week I found myself home with my two children. I had just received my second covid inoculation and was feeling a bit run down myself, but I did not want to squander this rare opportunity to spend alone time with my kids! The Covid-19 pandemic as a whole has been a tragic, frightening event, but I will always cherish the summer I got to spend every day outside with my babies. I took them to the Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, one of our favorite “safe space” hangouts from last year, to walk the grounds and kick the slush around under a blue sky.
It was here on one of these particularly wet paths that I ran into two women, one of which commented that it was nice I brought them out on such a nice day. I laughed and said flippantly “I figured they didn’t need to sit in a classroom today.”
In response, this woman gestured around her and said with utter sincerity, “This IS a learning space.”
I grinned, even though I knew she couldn’t see it behind my mask. “I think so too.”
The lady laughed and turned back to her friend, ”And I’m a pediatrician, so you can quote me on that if anyone asks.”
It’s not just our career teachers that are seeing this. It’s not just the parents who know their “energetic kids” focus better when in motion. Doctors who specialize in children are urging for parents and educators alike to integrate consistent, long-form play into all aspects of children’s lives. Physically, they are stronger. Mentally, they are more able to pay attention and less likely to have sensory issues.
Social competencies and emotional resilience suffer greatly without consistent peer-interaction in a playful and imaginative setting as well! Children often work out a lot of their big questions and anxieties of the day by integrating it into safe-space imaginative play reenactments. Without being able to work these issues out themselves, children are unsure of their own abilities to problem solve, and those anxieties and dependencies grow.
Here is a fantastic article from The American Academy of Pediatrics all about The Power of Play if you would like to read more:
The Power of Play: A Pediatric Role in Enhancing Development in Young Children
It’s not that wrote learning, memorization, and standardized long-form curriculums don’t work, it’s that they miss the point of education entirely. They leave behind many and narrow the focus of the rest, curbing creativity, independent thought, and resilience to the necessary process of failure.
Think about any lesson you still remember 10, 20, 30 years later. Which ones stuck with you?
For me it’s almost always the games. My sixth grade teacher had us turn our entire classroom into a bunch of cardboard houses to mimic Hoovervilles. She dunked our feet in cold water and drew cards with battlefield injuries to give us a taste of war on the front. In third grade, multiplication songs and games stuck with me way longer than any flashcard work. Watching pumpkins rot, playing with baby chicks hatching from eggs and experiencing them grow was a poignant way to learn about the life cycles of living things. One of my favorites was pretending to be sound waves bouncing around a back alley. Even “Which President was it?” trivia tag helped facts that HAD to be memorized something fun and worth doing.
To reinvigorate education as a whole we have to reunite the JOY that should come with it, the fascination, the wonder. Let the kids run off in their excitement and experience a lesson with their whole bodies. Let them learn more than you thought, more widely than you thought. You’ll be surprised what you learn when you’re muddy and out of breath too.
Go Play! Keep Learning! Most of all, Have Fun!
Miss LJ
CG Challenges: A Mile a Day
Hello Everyone!
Miss Liz and I have been noticing the incredible benefits of daily, extended outside time on our students. They’re sturdier and more resilient. They have more energy but are simultaneously more able to pay attention.
With shorter days and bitter winds it is often harder to get out, especially after school and work. We totally get that. It is why we have started our own mile a day challenge. One mile of walking or running each day. That’s a twenty minute walk on average! It has been such a refreshing incentive to get out there even when we want to stay under our blankets and cuddle our dogs!
THEN we thought… do you know who would love this challenge? Our school-aged kids. They have to sit in front of the computer all day for school. Even if it’s cold, there is no better way to shake the sillies out than a brisk walk in the fresh air.
Monday through Friday, every day, we are going to get those kids out there, and we want you to join us! Walk a mile on your lunch break. Take a walk after work around your block or cul de sac. You’d be surprised how much energy you have for the rest of your Saturday if it begins with a mile in your shoes! It’s as good as a cup of coffee.
What do you think? Join us? We still have 26 days of January to go! You could also go from January 10 to February 10, or March 15 to April 15, every day is a new day to start something wonderful for yourself.
We will be posting our journey through January. Every day will be a little adventure, and while we are sharing ours, we hope you will share yours too! Do you have a little park by your house? Do you walk the trails? Do you prefer to bike the mile with your kiddos? Do you have a four-pawed companion that comes with you?
Post pictures or stories and use the hashtag #CGMileADay so we can see them all!
Show us what your mile looks like!
One mile a day… take that first step!
Miss LJ
Common Ground: Winter Activities and Winter Attire
We are looking at A LOT OF snowy days coming up this winter!!
And we cannot wait for all of our outdoor winter adventures. There will be some days that are too wet or too cold! We will have little movie and popcorn parties and days where we do art while the weather outside is frightful.
But more and more studies are coming out showing how essential outdoor play is to our kids, and how the loss of consistent outdoor playtime is absolutely detrimental to their holistic well being. Kids are meant to play. They are meant to get dirty and windswept. They are meant to eat snow, trip in their swishy snow-pants, to fall down and find they can get back up again.
Play to Learn, Learn to Play Examples:
1. Building an Igloo with Friends: Promotes core strength, cooperation, simple machines and tools usage, basic engineering, imaginative play, patience, sensory endurance
2. Snow Walking and Rolling down Hills: Inner Ear training, strength training, leg and inner core training, aerobic workout
3. Snow Writing: Using natural tools to promote fine-motor practice. You can also use markers to do color work.
4. Winter Walk: Aerobic Exercise, Seasonal Cycles and Lessons, basic biology flora/fauna studies
Our preschool teachers are especially focused on “Kindergarten-Readiness.” This involves working on letters and numbers and pre-writing skills, but it also involves physical health and social-emotional independence. Outdoor lessons and games help cement fine-motor and gross-motor work. Operating in varying weather helps develop their sensory resilience which is essential for increasing attention span inside and outside of the classroom.
What do we always say? NO BAD WEATHER. ONLY BAD CLOTHES!
Is you child really set up for this winter? Here are items that we have on our student supply list that we highly recommend purchasing as soon as possible:
Kids Snow Boots — Snow comes in all different shapes and sizes, but it is always cold and always wet. An insulated, water resistant boot that goes high up a child’s leg will keep them warm and dry while they play. PLEASE NOTE: While rainbows will keep a child’s foot dry, they are not properly insulated and do not offer any protection against the cold. Snow boots are most appropriate in cold, wintry weather.
Snow Gloves — Snow gloves protect against the cold, but they are also water resistant. Cotton gloves, while warm, will become wet very quickly and will do more harm than good when trying to keep your child’s hands warm. Please make sure they have snow gloves available.
Snow Pants — Snow pants are key to making sure a child is warm and happy for a longer period of time. The water resistant fabric makes sure that the pants they wear to school stay as dry as possible so fewer clothing changes are required.
Thermal Underwear — We recommend these over sweat suits because they keep a child warm without overheating them or keeping their sweat in. These are perfect for layering winter clothes and helping a child regulate their body temperature while they play rough outside.
We will keep you all posted on our winter lessons and activities! Stay safe!!
— LJ and the Common Ground Crew
Unplugged Life: No Bad Weather, Only Bad Clothes
Our Rising Stars this week took a nature walk and, under the cloudless blue November sky, they read “Corduroy” in an open field. Our teachers Ms. Petty and Ms. Vanessa heavily utilize the outdoors in their carefully constructed curriculum (this week’s theme is Friendship!) to ensure that the children are free to learn and play while adhering to our COVID-19 safety measures.
While we have been adhering to health code, however, we find that children who get plenty of sunshine and activity are also better listeners with longer attention-spans. We are encouraging our teachers and our parents to utilize the outdoors as much as possible in all of their activities year-round, whether or not there is a pandemic.
“But Ms. LJ, the weather has been fabulous!” you say, “How can we take our children out all the time when it gets cold and dark and wet?”
Repeat after me, because I forget too: THERE’S NO BAD WEATHER, ONLY BAD CLOTHES!
There’s no bad weather! Okay, watch out for tornadoes and hurricanes… and if there is lightning RIGHT next to you definitely find a safe space ( Go HERE For instructions on how to calculate the distance between you and a lightning strike) but barring exceptional highs and lows, most weather is perfectly fine for kids and adults of all ages!
In fact, occupational therapists encourage parents to take children outside in all seasons to help brain development and mitigate sensory issues that are on the rise in children.
For more on outside play and holistic healthy development, check out this CoordiKids Article
Need some tips for Good “Bad Weather” Gear?
Our Supply Lists include clothing pieces suitable for battling the elements.
TIPS
When it comes to jackets, make sure you have a LIGHT JACKET , a HEAVY JACKET, and a RAIN JACKET. We recommend with any raincoats you buy that they are knee-length! The bigger, the better, to protect them when they splash.
Crocs make excellent shoes, especially if you are planning to get wet or muddy. They are “feet-shaped” which provides extra comfort to growing kids. Here are some RAIN BOOTS they make, along with their classic style.
Extremities get cold first! Make sure you have appropriate gloves for the weather. If they are too heavy or unwieldy, your child may not want to use them and it makes outside a frustrating experience. If it is snowing or wet outside than cloth gloves may not be enough, and the adventure will be short and painful on little fingers! Check the weather, and tuck the right pair in your kids’ coat pockets!
When it is really hot and bright outside, make sure your kids clothes are lightweight and UV-protected! SUNHATS are perfect for littles to protect their sensitive eyes while outside so that they stay focused and happy! SUNSHIRTS and SUNSUITS are key for needed extra (and adorable) protection.
OUR BIGGEST, MOST IMPORTANT TIP!!!
All of our teachers dress for the weather. It helps them stay comfortable and fun and safe. Kids can tell what their adults are feeling, and if you are excited and ready for adventure, no matter what the weather report says? They will be too. SO PUT ON YOUR RAINBOOTS AND GO STOMP IN SOME PUDDLES!! The mud washes away. Memories build a bright future.
— MS LJ
Non-Screen Life: Training your Inner Ear
Hey everybody! We are here to talk to you about:
PLAYING OUTSIDE!
GETTING DIRTY!
Finding that SAFE DANGER!
We know with the pandemic, 2020 has been a year of hand sanitizer and indoor quarantine. But it has also been a year of finding your own fun! Going into the woods and rolling down hills. Climbing trees and hanging upside down. Going out in fields and spinning like tops.
According to Pediatric Occupational Therapist Angela Hanscom, not only are these things incredible for attention and sensory issues, they are a KEY ROLE in developing The Vestibular System. This is the system our bodies use to know where we are in space! It is even more important than it sounds. Without serious play, children are more frail, more clumsy, less able to pay attention, and much more likely to struggle with emotional regulation.
Our children spend a long time sitting upright with little movement. Help them train their inner ears by:
Going Upside Down
Rolling Down Hills
Spinning In Circles (10x in each direction ought to do it… with hilarious results)
Climbing Trees
Jumping off Swings
Tossing them in the air
Sliding down slides on their bellies
Teachers and Parents should be life guards in play rather than consistent active participants. We want to ensure the children are safe and healthy, but too much structure and restriction has been shown to be detrimental! Let the kids fall. The dirt can offer so many essential lessons to growing up healthy!
We will be posting more on the benefits of outdoor play here so keep your eyes out! In the meantime, go have fun and WORK THOSE EARS!
For more on Angela Hanscom’s research and Timbernook Program, click here!
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