Despite the lifting of the statewide mask mandate in schools earlier this week, some local preschools and early childhood education centers are staying the course.
At Ibero Early Childhood Services on Clifford Avenue, Executive Director Ida Perez said since the start of this school year, masks have been encouraged for children, but not enforced. Adults, however, are required to stay masked.
“it’s difficult for child care centers, especially those like ours who service kids 0 through 4, because those kids are the most vulnerable ones and they cannot be vaccinated,” Perez said. “So we’re going to do what we need to do to protect them.”
At the Childfirst Network on South Avenue, Ann Marie Stephan said masks will remain required in classrooms at least until next Friday, a decision that has been mostly supported by staff and parents.
“We just completed February break last week,” Stephan said, “and people can develop symptoms for up to 10 days after exposure, so to be on the safe side, we wanted everybody to continue to be masked.”
Michelle Cohen-Johnson, a preschool teacher at the Childfirst Network, works with children between 4 and 5 years old.
Most of her students have gotten used to wearing masks at this point, she said, and some even enjoy the patterns like dinosaurs or cars.
But she said what’s been most interesting is seeing how they process their understanding of COVID-19 and the pandemic through play.
“Whenever you’re playing ‘doctor,’ you’re taking a COVID test. If you're in ‘housekeeping,’ you’re sick from COVID and you’re taking a test,” she said. “But that’s how they learn.”
Stephan said one of the more effective ways of helping young students adapt to changes in their routines has been through stories that illustrate situations and how to overcome them. These can, for instance, break down the steps of daily routines like handwashing to getting off a school bus and more.
That’s been particularly important for children who have had little to no experience outside their own homes during the pandemic, she said.
