Letter from the Director!

Dear Parents,

In March, we celebrated “National Read Across America Day” with a surprise visit from the Cat in the Hat, who read some Dr. Seuss books to our children. Later in the month, our Early Head Start Team also visited the classrooms for a Dr. Seuss book reading event! Every day our teachers read to the children at DCDC, but it was extra special to have costumed visitors in the classroom.

It’s important to read a book or tell a story to your child every day. When you talk, read, and sing to your children—even before they can use words—you’re building their brain and helping to prepare them for success in school and in life. Your loving touch combined with back and forth mimicking of your infant’s sounds and facial expressions are the first steps in talking. As you feed your infant, use words to describe what foods taste, feel, and look like. Your touch and voice helps your child learn.

For toddlers, everywhere you go, talk about what you see—a stop sign, a traffic light, or a tree. These things might seem boring to you, but it’s a whole new world to your child.

Using words that align with math, science, and sensory in your everyday conversations with your preschoolers can help them to do better in math and reading when they reach elementary school.

Talking about numbers also builds math skills. Here at DCDC, the teachers in the preschool classrooms provide the children with opportunities for early understanding of addition and subtraction by giving them access to a math center where they can count the numbers of items in a group of objects, add and remove objects to a group, and compare groups of objects to figure out which group has more or less.

Delaware Child Development Center also has a resource room located in the headquarters building, where you can check out books and learning activities for your child. If your home library is limited, feel free to take advantage of our resource room any time!

Tina McClintic

Director