Happy Spring, Orca Community!
In like a lion, out like a lamb? With the first day of spring arriving this Friday, the unpredictable weather and forcasts--Snow in March--continues to keep us on our toes.
Besides the weather, spring also brings more light and more time for our Orcas to be outside and enjoying our beautiful island. We want to encourage outdoor play, structured, with sports and clubs, and unstructured, as well.
Brain research shows how important it is for children to have unstructured play and down time and to be outside in the grass, dirt, and nature. In our current world, filled with technology and stimulating video games, children are losing their interest in the very important skill of being bored and playing alone, with siblings, and friends.
Unstructured play stimulates imagination and creativity, helps develop emotional regulation strategies and self-regulation, teaches and reinforces important social skills, assists in teaching and negotiating problem solving and conflict resolution, and promotes exercise, coordination and physical fitness. There is also a strong correlation between unstructured play and lowering anxiety.
Even among all the structured learning we do in school, we have time for fun and play. We know that in order for students to learn and retain information and skills, they need time for play and fun to order their learning into their long term memory and develop their social and emotional skills. Our youngest students are getting both structured and unstructured play during the day at recess and in the classroom and we make sure we have plenty of time for our older students to connect and spend time playing at recess, in specialists, and during community times.
This spring, we invite you to get outside, get a little dirty, and have some fun!
P.S. Talking about fun, mark your calendar for our second Orca Splash Celebration on May 7th!
Sincerely,
Rhonda
