August 2009,
Dear Parents,
It is with great excitement and anticipation that I would like to welcome and welcome back all of you to the Early Childhood program at RPRY. As a graduate of the school, I am very excited to continue and grow the early childhood program at RPRY. I have master’s degrees in both education and social work and I have been working in the field of early childhood education for nearly ten years. Working with young children in a Jewish setting is my passion and life’s fulfillment.
The early childhood program at RPRY has been growing for a long time. Being able to help formulate it into a cohesive part of the school is very exciting for me. I am a strong believer in play based learning. Children learn to negotiate the world around them by physically experiencing how the world works. Children learn math skills by playing with blocks. They gain science skills by mixing colors and creating new ones. Children learn about language and literacy by listening to books – by hearing rhymes and repetitions and by seeing that when letters are placed in a specific order they make words.
A yeshiva education does not end with the secular, however. The children at RPRY learn Torah, berachot, and midot – all lessons that they will carry through their years in RPRY and beyond. It is a love of Jewish learning coupled with the secular that helps to create the well rounded neshama that we are so proud of in our RPRY students.
My door is always open and I look forward to getting to know all of you in the weeks ahead.
Shana Tova
Stacey Rockman