Every year the Early Learning Center (ELC) at Gateway Community College (GCC) celebrates The Week of the Young  Child™ (WOYC) with many events for children and their families. The WOYC™ is an annual celebration hosted by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) celebrating early learning, young children, their teachers, and families. This year, from April 16-20, GCC students and families gathered with librarian Martha Lipowski, for The Little Read, a local event through the New Haven Early Childhood Council (NHECC), to read and talk about this year’s book, Brick by Brick written by Giuliano Ferri. Children were able to act out parts of the wordless story with cardboard bricks and animal masks. At the conclusion of each classroom's reading, children were given a copy of the book to take home and share with their families. 
 
Visitors taught the children music and yoga, and classrooms did many activities that supported the WOYC themes: Music Monday, Tasty Tuesday, Work Together Wednesday, Artsy Thursday and Family Friday as well as projects based on the theme of the book "Brick by Brick." The families also worked on a take home project called Family Coat of Arms where they created a visual representation of their family culture. On Family Friday the children shared their creation at circle time. They are now displayed in our hallway.
 
The Early Learning Center’s Annual Art Show was held from mid-March through mid-April which allowed the children to share their artwork with the GCC community. A family breakfast was organized by Parent Coordinator Heather Hartmann and children were able to journey upstairs to the third floor student gallery where the paintings, drawings and sculpture were on display. Visitors were invited to write down comments and words of encouragement in the guest book for the student artists to hear. 
 
For questions about the Early Learning Center, please contact Director Sarah Chambers at (203) 285-2132 or  This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..