Child Care Health and Safety Newsletter
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The Snohomish Health District has been providing up-to-date health and safety information and consultation to child care providers in Snohomish County for many years. We now have a new look to our newsletters. Each month you will receive articles, available STARS classes, and links to useful resources.
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We hope you like our new look and enjoy our June edition focusing on summertime topics.
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Summer Sunshine Means Sunscreen Time
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Summertime is coming, and that means one thing: more time in the sun! Before you reach for that bottle of sunscreen, here are a few things to keep in mind:
- The best way to stay safe from the sun is to not be exposed to it. Consider having children wear hats and sun protective clothing for maximum coverage. Find shaded areas outside.
- Sunscreen is considered a medication. Make sure you have proper authorization forms.
- Your application method should ensure germs are not spread from one child's skin to the next through handwashing, glove use, having older children self-apply, etc.
- Spray on sunscreens are not recommended. You can learn more from Seattle Children's Hospital here.
- When selecting a sunscreen, ensure it is at least SPF 30 and protective against both UVA and UBV rays.
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Outdoor Play: Winning Play for Health and Learning
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"Time in nature is not leisure time; it's an essential investment in our children's health (and also, by the way, our own.)"
-Richard Louv
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Caring for Our Children: Health and Safety Standards for Early Learning, 3rd Ed.
recommends that children play outdoors twice a day and hopefully for a total of at least 60 minutes during the child care and early learning program. Infants also should be taken out twice a day for the benefits of fresh air exposure and experiencing the perspective of a much more expansive landscape not available indoors. This contributes to additional ways for babies to engage with their surroundings and builds brain cells.
Because
research
shows that children do not play outdoors enough, regularly scheduled outdoor play during child care and early learning can increase a child’s daily dose of moderate to vigorous activity. Open spaces in outdoor areas, even those confined to screened rooftops in urban play spaces, encourage children to develop gross motor skills and fine motor play in ways that are difficult to duplicate indoors. Children acquire their most vigorous activities outdoors…What do they do when their feet hit the ground? RUN! This gets the heart rate moving and increases oxygen flow to the brain and helps maintain a healthy weight. Also, short exposure of the skin to sunlight promotes the production of vitamin D that growing children require.
Outdoor time offers play adventures for children that is well suited for exploring nature and developing the senses. In addition to being fun it provides a rich and creative learning environment. Because outdoor play involves more vigorous, gross motor movement, children’s social interactions vary from those that occur indoors. The wider expanse that space and varying textures provide, naturally inspires children to use their imagination and pretend being forest animals or moving objects ( planes, trains, fire engines.) An outdoor obstacle course may encourage a team approach to locomotion movement: hopping, jumping, skipping, galloping. A wide open yard allows practicing fundamental movement skills with each other such as tossing, catching, kicking, balancing. All of these activities support additional exposure to language, math and science concepts...A practical way to teach children about the seasons is to observe how life outside changes from month to month.
April marked the 10 year anniversary of the book
Last Child in the Woods: Saving our Children from Nature Deficit Disorder
by the renowned child advocate Richard Louv. The message is just as applicable now as it was 10 years ago. "Playing outdoors develops skills in problem solving, critical thinking, and decision making. Even creativity is stimulated by childhood experiences in nature."
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Respond to ACEs - Build Resilience
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The effects of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) can begin to show early in a child’s life. Overreacting to teacher directions, inability to regulate emotions in a developmentally appropriate manner, violent or aggressive behaviors, mild intellectual deficits causing concerns with attention and language development, the list goes on; you may have experienced many of these in your child care setting. As a provider, how can you help children who have clearly (or not so clearly) experienced some traumas?
In a word: resilience. Research shows that the best way to address, and even counter-balance, the negative effects of ACEs is for children to develop resilience, the foundation of which is a loving and stable relationship with a trustworthy adult. You can help a child build resilience by your interactions with the child. Karen Petty, a Professor and Department Chair of Early Child Development at Texas Woman’s University, suggests ten classroom practices that are practical and can be easily applied in her article, “Ten Ways to Foster Resilience in Young Children: Teaching Kids to Bounce Back.”
Perry’s first strategy is to build empathy by helping children become more understanding or able to see from the viewpoint of someone else. She gives examples of how to implement this strategy using children’s books. Perry writes, “When children begin to see that other children have some of the same feelings that they do, they may begin to identify those feelings in others and experience compassion, perspective taking, and/or empathy.”
For an in-depth explanation of all ten steps, you can access the article using the link to the left.
As always, I would be happy to speak more with you regarding ACEs, resilience, or other behavioral health concerns. Please reach out to me. –
Alexandria Deas
, MA, LMHCA, MHP
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Summertime Illness and Injury Prevention Class
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Summertime brings opportunity for child cares to incorporate different experiences and more outdoor time into their programs.
Sunshine, water play, picnics, and field trips are all a part of summertime fun. But these fun activities are not without risk. Learn how to keep children safe while they experience the joys that come with the season.
This class offers 2 STARS credits.
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Find a full list of our 2018 classes
here.
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Contact Information
Snohomish Health District
3020 Rucker Ave., Ste. 104
Everett, WA 98201
Program Phone: 425.252.5415
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Connect with the
Child Care Health Outreach Program
The Child Care Health Outreach Program staff are available to consult with you on these and other health and safety topics by phone, by email, or at your child care.
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Connect with Snohomish Health District
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