Will you consider a end-of-year contribution to support DEY's work? In the month of December, our only and once-a-year Annual Appeal, Defending the Early Years asks fellow educators, advocates, and friends to consider a donation to our organization to help us with achieving our goals to bring forth an early education for children that is grounded in equity, justice and child development.

We also learned that a generous supporter has offered to match each donation made until December 31st, dollar for dollar.

We have a lot of work to do in 2021 and your contribution helps us to continue our work on behalf of young children.

See below for DEY's accomplishments during 2020.

Certainly, 2020 has been a challenging year for everyone - including DEY. But despite the pandemic, Defending the Early Years has had a successful year of working toward and accomplishing our mission by providing resources for parent and teachers of young children, advocating for appropriate early childhood education, and fighting for the rights and needs of young children. Check out our 2020 accomplishments...by the numbers!

1. . .The number of COVID-19 resources compiled and distributed (Guidance for Supporting Young Children through COVID-19) to help parents and teachers in the early days of the pandemic.

2. . .The number of Comprehensive reports we published,

3. . .The number of Videos we produced,

3. . .The number of webinars we broadcasted, all helping parents and teachers deal with COVID-19.

7. . .The number of policy priorities announced in our Position Statement on Policy Priorities.

13. . .The number of mini-grants awarded to grassroots advocates from Massachusetts and Arizona to Guatemala and Kenya. (See Mini-grants.)

18. . .The number of op-eds, articles, and blogs written by and about DEY, including:

62. . .The number of advocates signed up for DEY's Working Groups. (See Working Groups). Our new working groups will direct DEY's policy direction for this next year. Our Working Group topics include:

559. . .The number of parents and teachers who participated in DEY's Survey on the Impact of COVID-19 on Young Children, Families, and Teachers.

1,021. . .The number of people who registered for DEY's Summer Institute, held online over four days in July. (See Summer Institute)

4,246. . .The number of subscribers to DEY's monthly newsletter.

10,000+. . .The number of followers on social media (Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn).

Teaching during a pandemic is challenging -- whether completely online, completely in person, or a hybrid. Our new COVID resource allows teachers the opportunity to share ideas for activities, music, storytelling and read-alouds, puppets, classroom management, and other ideas.

We invite all teachers to share their valuable resources and ideas!

Our colleague, Peter Gray, research professor in the Department of Psychology at Boston College, will be conducting an online course entitled Mother Nature's Pedagogy: How Adults Can Facilitate Children's Natural Ways of Learning.

The class will meet for six sessions on Wednesdays from 7-9 pm EST, beginning December 9th. Cost is $150.

Topics include:

**Note that if you miss any sessions, recordings will be available**

DEY, as a partner organization, will receive $15 for every person registering for the course, using this specific registration link. We hope to see you in class with Peter Gray on the 9th.