Week of the Young Child: Tasty Tuesday

Today’s Week of the Young Child theme is Tasty Tuesday. We’ll take this opportunity to highlight childhood nutrition and the importance of consistent and healthy meals because after all, a hungry child cannot learn. And don’t forget to read below to find out today’s public Pre-K raffle winner!

The state of Maine has a number of programs that support the health and well-being of Maine’s youngest learners. Each of these programs helps fight hunger and obesity by reimbursing organizations such as schools, child care centers, family child care programs, and after-school programs for providing healthy meals to children.

So, how can you encourage healthy habits in your setting? Here are some ideas from Mabel Yu, Associate Editor at the National Association for the Education of Young Children (2017).

Introduce the child to a variety of foods.
Discuss where various foods come from. Grocery shop together. Visit farms, farmers markets, and orchards, if possible, to speak directly to farmers.
Cook together! The child can stir, add ingredients and spices, roll dough, etc. Introduce new or “unusual” foods slowly and in different ways (e.g. raw onions in a salad don’t taste like caramelized onions in a taco).
Show flexibility. Model trying new things and refrain from acting negatively towards foods you don’t prefer.
Read together. Discover how specific foods relate to different cultures, practice funny food rhymes, or learn about nutrients.

Statewide programs that support childhood nutrition:

Maine Department of Education Child Nutrition Team Programs include:
- National School Lunch Program (NSLP)
- Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP)
- Afterschool Snack Service
- Breakfast Programs
- Culinary Classroom
- Farm & Sea to School
- Fresh Fruit & Vegetable Program (FFVP)
- Summer Food Service Program (SFSP)
NAPSACC, a FREE online tool to help child care programs give children a healthy start. For programs serving children birth to age 5, the tool provides self-assessments, action planning, a library of tips and materials, and training videos to support children’s healthy habits through practices, policies, and environments. The self-assessment tools are easy to complete and lead to goal setting and action planning. The tool is flexible, can be customized to your programs, and is easy to use. The videos can be watched by all staff and count toward licensing requirements for training hours. Go NAPSACC covers seven topics areas: Child Nutrition, Breastfeeding & Infant Feeding, Farm to ECE, Oral Health, Infant & Child Physical Activity, Outdoor Play & Learning and Screen Time. Additionally, Go NAPSACC’s Self-Assessments and Action Planning can help your program meet Standard 7 of Rising Stars for ME: Health, Safety, Nutrition, and Physical Activity. Want to learn more, visit the Go NAPSACC website. Interested in a Go NAPSACC account? Fill out the Go NAPSACC account request form or contact Karen Bergeron at bergeron@maine.edu or 207-653-5090.
If your program serves older children, check out Let’s Go! 5-2-1-0. Let’s Go! is a community engagement initiative that partners with schools, school nutrition programs, early care and education programs, and out-of-school programs to help create spaces where the healthy choice is the easy choice across Maine and Carroll County, NH. The Let’s Go! program is flexible and can be easily woven into your organization, whether you’re running an in-home day care or part of a large center. Using the Let’s Go! Self-Assessment, we will help you assess your program environment and set a goals to support creating and sustaining a healthy environment. Let’s Go! provides tools, resources and trainings based on your program strengths and areas for growth focused on healthy eating and physical activity. For more information, check out Let’s Go! Maine or email letsgo@mainehealth.org

WOYC 2024 Raffle Winner for Tasty Tuesday is: RSU 3

Congratulations!

Week of the Young Child: Music Monday

Week of the Young Child: Music Monday

We want to thank you for joining us in celebrating the Week of the Young Child! This is a national event promoting the importance of high-quality early learning sponsored by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). This year the Maine Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Child and Family Services have teamed up to support early childhood educators across the state to join the celebration and promote the vital work they do every day in their child care programs and Pre-K through 3rd grade elementary school classrooms. This year’s goal is to help elevate the importance of high-quality early learning and care for the greater community through positive stories and photos showing high-quality practices and strategies to build positive relationships and a sense of community. We’re excited to share the positive impact Maine’s early educators are making with the children and families in your program or classroom!

Each day will focus on a theme related to whole child development and playful learning. As Fred Rogers wisely said, “Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But, for children, play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.” When focusing on the whole student, ensuring the early childhood years are filled with opportunities for play fosters growth across all domains of development including creative arts.

For Music Monday, let’s focus on creative expression which allows a young child to engage in their own imagination. It offers them an opportunity to express themselves in ways that are unique to them and to form an appreciation for the unique expressions of others. Fostering creativity in young children allows them to explore, examine and reflect upon their own individual form of creative expression. Providing experiences such as music, movement, dance, dramatic play, and experimentation with a variety of art media, allows a child to explore the different dimensions of the creative arts. An early educator who promotes these experiences and builds upon these skills not only supports young children’s creative efforts but also reinforces language, understanding, and appreciation of the arts.

In addition to celebrating each theme throughout the week, we’ll also share statewide programs that support whole child development and playful learning:

The Maine Department of Education offers free access to instructional programs for children in grades Pre-K through grade 1 which focus on whole child development and incorporate play-based experiences through daily, literacy rich lessons that build on developmentally appropriate practices and science-based concepts.
Maine Roads to Quality Professional Development Network (MRTQ-PDN) offers Relationship Based Technical Assistance based on the standards in Maine’s Quality Rating and Improvement System: Rising Stars for ME and supports ECE professional’s desire to enhance the quality of care for young children, including whole child development and playful learning. Offerings include:
- Consultation– Collaborative partnership between you and a District Coordinator that supports positive solutions, develops a plan with action steps to meet goals, and deepens professional learning. This can be done through a phone/email, warm line, and/or virtual and on site consultation.
- Peer-to-Peer Networks– Facilitated groups where you make connections with others and expand your professional learning and development. Participant driven Community of practice (CoP) or a Professional Learning Community (PLC) focused on a specific topic. To learn more about the MRTQ PDN Technical Assistance team, explore these resources: District Coordinator Coverage Map and MRTQ PDN TA System
Maine Early Childhood Outdoor Network is an inclusive statewide network made up of early childhood stakeholders that works to connect the Maine early childhood community to each other with resources to support outdoor and nature-based learning experiences that prioritize the full scope of children’s development.

Be on the lookout this week for winners of Maine’s Week of the Young Child Raffle brought to you by partnership between the Maine Department of Education, Maine Department of Health and Human Service’s Office of Child and Family Services, Maine Roads to Quality Professional Development Network, Maine Association of Educating Young Children, and Family Child Care Association of Maine.

Celebrating Early Childhood Education Day at the State House

Staff from Maine’s Department of Education’s (DOE) Early Learning Team and Child Development Services gathered with several other Early Childhood agencies, organizations, and programs in the Hall of Flags at the Maine State House in Augusta on Thursday, March 21st for the annual Early Childhood Day at the Hall of Flags.

The event allowed early childhood educators, families, and advocates to unite to celebrate and elevate the need for high-quality early care and education (ECE) opportunities and the importance of a strong ECE workforce in Maine.

Maine DOE Early Learning Team and members of Child Development Services (pictured above) took part in the event by sharing resources and facilitating a session related to public pre-k partnerships.

For more information and resources on early learning in Maine, visit:

Maine Department of Education Ramping Up for Kindergarten Entry Inventory Project

Calling all Maine kindergarten teachers, administrators, and curriculum directors! Are you interested in exploring strategies to help support transitions from early childhood settings into a Kindergarten setting? If so, you may be interested in engaging in an upcoming project the Maine Department of Education (DOE) is launching related to the design of a Kindergarten Entry Inventory (KEI).

A KEI is a tool administered in the beginning of Kindergarten to help teachers gather information about children’s development across a range of domains so that teachers can be responsive to children’s learning. Additionally, data aggregated from KEIs can help strengthen Maine’s early care and education system by identifying areas of steady growth and continuous improvement.

In 2022, the Maine Department of Education (DOE), in partnership with the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), was awarded the Preschool Development Renewal Grant B-5. This three-year, $8,000,000/year grant supports early care and educational programming for our youngest students. One of the many projects included in the grant is the development of a KEI.

If you are an early childhood educator or school administrator serving these grade levels, please be on the lookout for an upcoming survey later this spring. The survey will gather multiple points of information including current assessment practices utilized as part of children’s transition into, and journey through, kindergarten. The survey will also gather educators’ thoughts about the design of a KEI and questions they may have. Additionally, the survey will offer an opportunity to recruit for educator involvement by either serving on a KEI Advisory Team or by being a Kindergarten Entry Implementation Team Member.

Keep watching your emails. More details and information will follow soon.

For questions, please reach out to Karen Mathieu, Maine DOE Kindergarten Entry Inventory Specialist, at karen.mathieu@maine.gov .

Public Pre-K Partnership Pilot Grant Request for Applications (RFA)

Maine’s Preschool Development Renewal Grant is supporting the Maine Department of Education in offering grant funding to school administrative units (SAUs) to increase the number of eligible 4-year-olds attending high-quality public Pre-Kindergarten (Pre-K) programming through partnerships with licensed community providers (center-based and family child care) during the 24-25 school year.

In order to realize its goal of achieving universal access for students to public Pre-K, the State is supporting SAUs in increasing the number of partnerships with licensed community-based providers (e.g., center based and family child care) to ensure equitable access to high-quality early care and education, especially for our most vulnerable children.

Partnerships with licensed community-based providers support SAUs to achieve full-day/full-week programming for children and to meet the needs of working families while increasing their offering of Public Pre-K.

The Public Pre-K Partnership Pilot Grant RFA will provide funding to support new partnerships with either a licensed center based provider or a licensed family child care provider.

The timeline for the RFA process is as follows:

March 22, 2024-RFA Released
April 8, 2024—Question Submission Deadline
April 25, 2024- RFA Submission Deadline

All questions about the Pre-K Partnership Pilot Grant RFA should be submitted to the Pre-K Partnership Pilot Grant Coordinator identified on the Grant RFPs and RFAs webpage.

Any additional questions about this opportunity may be directed to Michelle Belanger, Pre-K Partnership Specialist, Michelle.Belanger@maine.gov.

(Registration Deadline Extended) Maine DOE and DHHS to Offer Early Childhood Summer Regional Summit Events With Mini Grant Opportunity

The Maine Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), in partnership with the Maine Department of Education (DOE), was awarded a Preschool Development Renewal Grant (PDG) from the US Department of Health and Human Services in December of 2022. With this three-year grant, the state is implementing initiatives to build greater infrastructure and capacity to create a more coordinated, efficient, and high-quality mixed delivery system for children ages birth to eight and their families. The plan builds upon successful cross-agency work to ensure that all children enter Kindergarten prepared to succeed and are well supported during the early elementary years.

Included in this grant is the opportunity for a summer summit series in 2024 and 2025 to support communities in their local system alignment and coordination for early childhood care and education programming from birth through the early elementary years. Teams accepted to participate in the summit will also be awarded $800 mini grants to support their efforts in developing and implementing action plans to address an identified early care and education need in their communities.

The goals of the Early Childhood Summit include:

Fostering community level coordination and collaboration across the mixed-delivery early care and education system, which includes child care programs, head start and elementary schools, to improve alignment and transitions for children and families.
Strengthening understanding of evidence-based practices that are critical to leverage across the birth-grade 3 span in order to promote whole child development.
Supporting community-based planning and implementation efforts through mini-grants and ongoing technical assistance support.

What will the summit structure be like? 

The content of the summit will include a variety of keynote addresses and workshop sessions connected to the goals outlined previously. Topics will include promoting inclusionary practices and addressing challenging behaviors, promoting play as a foundational learning strategy, and promoting smooth transitions from early childhood education programs into public schools for children and families. Time will also be provided for teams to work collaboratively on action planning.

When will the summits be held? 

The 1-day summits will be held in two regions (see dates/locations below). Teams will apply to attend in one of the two locations. The summits will run from 8:30 a.m.- 4:00 p.m.

Thursday, July 11, 2024, Keeley’s Banquet Center, 178 Warren Avenue, Portland, Maine
Tuesday, July 16, 2024, Jeff’s Catering & Event Center, 15 Event Center Way, Brewer, Maine

What are the requirements of participation for all team members?

All team members will be expected to participate in the professional development and technical assistance components outlined below.

The components include:	Projected timeline:
One check in meeting prior to the July 2024 Summit	June 2024
Attendance and participation at Summer Summit July 2024	July 11 or 16, 2024
Bi-annual consult with the Departments (1/2)	Fall 2024
Bi-annual consult with the Departments (2/2)	Winter 2025
Attendance and participation at Summer Summit in July 2025	July 2025

What is the composition of teams?

Teams may have up to five members. There must be at least:

one public early elementary school educator and
one child care provider/educator represented (family child care and/or child care center) on the team.

The additional three members may include but are not limited to:

Representative of the local business community
Parent of a child using early childhood services
School Administrator
Home Visitor
Mental health care provider
Head Start Representative
Health care provider
Community librarian
Representative of an organization that supports workforce development
Provider of services under the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, Part B or Part C
Provider of professional development to early care and education professionals
A faculty member of a career and technical center or higher education institution specializing in early childhood, if available

How will the mini grants work?

Each team will receive an eight-hundred-dollar ($800) grant to support their action planning and implementation work over the first year. Another min-grant will be available following successful completion of the first year and participation in 2025 summit.

To apply: 

Complete the application found here (Word Doc) and return all documents electronically by May 20, 2024 to Andrea Faurot at Andrea.Faurot@maine.gov.

All team members must sign an agreement ensuring team participation.

For additional information, please reach out to Renee Reilly, Maine DOE PDG Manager at Renee.A.Reilly@maine.gov or Andrea Faurot, OCFS PDG Manager at Andrea.Faurot@maine.gov.

Information for Celebrating The Week of the Young Child April 6th – 12th

The Week of the Young Child is a national event promoting the importance of high-quality early learning sponsored by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). This year the Maine Department of Education and the Office of Child and Family Services are teaming up to support early childhood educators across the state to join the celebration and promote the vital work they do every day in their child care programs and Pre-K through 3rd grade elementary school classrooms.

The event takes place during the Week of April 6th – 12th with a kickoff on Saturday and interdisciplinary daily themes for the following week.

We hope that you will join us in celebrating the Week of the Young Child! To help elevate the importance of high-quality early learning and care for the great community, please share photos through this form to show how your early learning program/classroom celebrates the Week of the Young Child by utilizing high-quality practices and strategies to build positive relationships and a sense of community in your early care and education setting.

We can’t wait to see the positive impact Maine’s early educators are making with the children and families in your program or classroom! To celebrate your efforts, we will be running a raffle for each day of the week. Your name will be entered once for every submission you make on the link above and the winner each day will receive a package of SWAG with items provided from the Office of Child and Family Services, the Early Learning Team at the Department of education, Maine Roads to Quality and the Maine Association for the Education of Young Children!

Don’t forget to mark your calendar for Early Childhood Education (ECE) Day at the State House on Thursday, March 21, 2024. This is an opportunity for early childhood educators, families, and ECE supporters to work together to elevate the need for high-quality early care and education opportunities and for the importance of a strong ECE workforce. Join us to celebrate the successes and call attention to the ongoing needs. For more information visit the events section of the MaineAEYC website.

If you have questions or would like more information on the Week of the Young Child, please reach out to one of the members of the Early Learning Team and/or a member of the Office of Child and Family Services listed below.

Early Childhood Specialist, Nicole.Madore@maine.gov

Family and Community Engagement Program Manager, Megan.Swanson@maine.gov

Celebrating National Preschool Teacher Appreciation Day on March 15, 2024

Preschool education is the essential foundation in a child’s developmental and educational journey. Neuroscience has demonstrated that the greatest period of brain development occurs in the preschool years, making high-quality experiences during this time pivotal for supporting life-long learning. The Maine Department of Education (DOE) is proud to celebrate National Preschool Teacher Appreciation Day on March 15, 2024, honoring Maine’s amazing public preschool programs and especially the backbone of these high-quality programs which are teachers themselves.

In Maine, preschool represents a lot of different programs funded by the state and federal government including Maine’s Child Development Services (CDS), which provides special education services to preschool and school-aged children through a network of nine regional sites, in addition to Head Start, a federal program that promotes the school readiness of children from low-income families with currently 11 programs across the state, as well as the 255 schools in over 165 school administrative units throughout Maine enrolling students in Maine’s amazing public pre-K programs.

“In preschool, children are beginning to develop their identities as lifelong learners, to love school, and to be curious,” said a pre-K teacher at Brunswick School Department. “They become curious about themselves, curious about each other, and curious about the world. Being the first stop in a child’s educational journey is part of the magic of being a preschool teacher.”

Maine is fortunate to have such a robust system for preschool children that is growing larger and stronger every year. The strength of these programs and the very reason they are successful is because of the preschool teachers and their dedication to meeting the needs of Maine children and their families. The return on investment in early education is larger than investments made in adolescence and adulthood, making the impact of preschool educators even more significant.

Here are what some of Maine’s preschool program coordinators had to say about their preschool teachers:

“Our preschool teachers are consistent and caring with the children at the CDS Preschools,” said Heather West, one of Maine’s Child Development Coordinators. “The kids light up when they see their teachers at arrival time, and it shows how important they’ve become to each other. You can tell that the teachers truly care about each child and family they work with!”

“SKCDC is so grateful to have an amazing team of early educators,” said Southern Kennebec Child Development Corporation (a Head Start program) Agency Director Cristina Salois. “They bring joy to their work, and children benefit from exploring, experimenting, and discovering indoors and out!”

Child Development Services Coordinator Deb Mullis shared what a parent told her recently, “My child lights up when we pull into the parking lot, and she sees her teacher ready to greet her.”

“Our children have been making tremendous progress toward their IEP [individualized education plan] goals due to the hard work and consistency of the teachers,” added West. “It wouldn’t be possible without the preschool teachers!”

Here are some pictures from preschool programs across Maine:

CDS preschool teachers

Artwork from a pre-K classroom

Children in a pre-K class

Activities in a Pre-K class

Children in a pre-K class

Children in Head Start

Pre-K Partnership Pilot Grant Informational Session

Is your school administrative unit (SAU) interested in starting or expanding public Pre-K with a community partner for the upcoming 2024-25 school year? If so, the Maine DOE’s Early Learning Team invites you to attend an informational session regarding a Pre-K Partnership Pilot Grant opportunity we anticipate releasing this Spring.

Pre-K Partnership Pilot Grant Informational Session

Date: March 13, 2024
Time: 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm
Description: To review the grant and pilot opportunity and anticipated requirements.
Register here

Through funding provided by Maine’s Preschool Development Renewal Grant, the Maine Department of Education intends to conduct a pilot to provide grant funding to School Administrative Units (SAUs) to increase the number of eligible 4-year-olds attending high-quality public Pre-Kindergarten (Pre-K) programming in licensed community partner settings (center-based and family child care). To realize its goal of reaching universal access to public Pre-K, the state will need to increase the number of partnerships with licensed community-based providers (e.g., center-based and family child care) to ensure equitable access to high-quality early care and education, especially for our most vulnerable children.

Applicant SAUs awarded these grant funds will be required to partner with licensed community-based providers (e.g., center-based and family child care) to provide either full-day/full week or half-day/full week Pre-K programming. For this pilot, Head Start partnerships will not be considered. A partnership is characterized by meaningful involvement in the planning, developing, and delivering of the proposed program for students and families.

The informational session will be recorded in case an interested entity isn’t able to attend. Following the informational session, interested SAUs/community partners should monitor the DOE Newsroom and the Division of Procurement Services site for the release of the RFA.

Questions may be directed to Michelle Belanger, Pre-K Partnership Specialist at michelle.belanger@maine.gov.

Pre-K for ME, K for ME, and 1st Grade for ME Program Overviews and Summer Training Opportunities

Since 2018, the Maine Department of Education (DOE) has adapted and piloted open-source instructional programs for early elementary grades based on the Boston Public School’s evidence-based Focus Curricula. Pre-K for ME was launched in 2019, K for ME was launched in 2021, and 1st Grade for ME was launched in 2023. 2nd Grade for ME is being piloted in Maine classrooms next year and will be made available for the 2025-2026 school year. These developmentally appropriate learning programs are interdisciplinary and align with Maine’s learning standards. While Maine schools are responsible for the purchase of classroom materials that support the use of these programs, lesson plans, outlines and other supporting documents can be accessed at no cost via the Maine DOE’s website.

An informational overview of the programs will be provided on March 7 from 3:30-4:30. The overview session will be recorded and posted for anyone unable to attend the live session. The overview session will share the basic program structures and review the materials needed to implement the programs. If unfamiliar with the programs, attending the overview (or watching the recording) is highly recommended.

Overview Session on March 7th, 3:30-4:30 – Register here.

Educators/schools/programs interested in utilizing Pre-K for ME, K for ME and/or 1st Grade for ME in the coming year may take advantage of initial trainings scheduled this summer. These trainings are provided at no cost to promote understanding of program design and to support successful program implementation. School administrators are strongly encouraged to attend the trainings with their Pre-K, Kindergarten and/or first grade teachers. Special educators, education technicians, and instructional coaches/curriculum leaders who work with pre-k, kindergarten and first grade teachers are also encouraged to attend. There is no cost to attend summer trainings.

This year’s training opportunities will be held in person from approximately 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. 2-day trainings are provided for each program.

Pre-K for ME– During the week of 7/29-8/2 (exact dates and location TBD)
K for ME– July 29th and 30th in the Augusta/Waterville area (exact location TBD)
1st Grade for ME– July 31st and August 1st in the Augusta/Waterville area (exact location TBD)

For teachers learning the K for ME and 1st Grade for ME programs, an additional training day will occur on Wednesday, June 26th from 8:30 to 3:30 (location TBD). Registration for these trainings should be completed by principals/educators with one registration on behalf of their school/program per grade. Details about how to prepare for the trainings and the training locations will be provided via email after registrations are received. Registrations for the 2-day training for each instructional program should be received by May 24, 2024.

The Summer Training Registration Link is now open. Please submit a separate response for each grade level in which you are registering educators: Pre-K for ME, K for ME, and/or 1st Grade for ME.

For additional information about Pre-K for ME, contact Marcy.r.Whitcomb@maine.gov and for K for ME and 1st Grade for ME, contact Leeann.Larsen@maine.gov or Nicole.Madore@maine.gov.