Please wear a mask inside school or wait outside for pickup.

Be courteous

Wear a mask when you leave your home when mandated.

Follow CDC travel guidance. As states and countries lift their restrictions, please pay close attention to CDC guidance around travel to specific regions. If you travel to these regions, you will need to follow CDC guidance for quarantining yourself and your family before returning to Garden of Learning Virginia.

Stay home if sick. If you or your child has been sick, we ask that all household members stay home until they’ve been symptom-free without medication.

Consistent with our COVID-19 Policy, if any student or their household member contracts the virus we will require the entire family to remain out of school for 14 days after the last household member test positive for the virus and also has an absence of symptoms.  This is to ensure no symptoms develop in the exposed child and also due to children typically lacking symptoms and running the risk of being a systematic carrier.

 Symptoms to watch for include

• Fever of 100.4 F or higher, now or in the preceding 72 hours (or would have, but have used fever reducing medicine)
• Cough
• Sore Throat
• Muscle Aches
• Difficulty Breathing
• New Loss of Taste or Smell 
• Diarrhea
• Vomiting
• Behavioral changes that prevent a child from participating in school activities

Restrictions.  At this time we will no longer accept outside items from home. No cups, book bags, toys, snacks, blankets, etc all necessary items will be provided by the school except diapers until further notice.

To minimize potential exposure, we ask that families wait in the front foyer if they enter our garden.

Garden of Learning Virginia Policies on Good Health and Proper Hygiene

We follow a rigorous hygiene and cleaning routine, including disinfecting high-touch surfaces like door handles, cleaning bathrooms often, and rotating toys so we can sanitize them even more frequently. 

No outdoor shoes are worn in our school. All students will remove their outdoor shoes and place them in their assigned cubby and change into their clean school shoes until recess or dismissal.

We emphasize and model the importance of proper hand washing. Our children receive a lesson on how to properly wash their hands alongside a visual guide.  To help children remember to wash hands for at least 20 seconds they will typically sing Happy Birthday (twice) or even recite the alphabet.  We reinforce this habit with children multiple times throughout the day.

Here are some ways we plan to do our part of keeping kids safe and healthy while in our program:

Getting sick is not fun but it’s apart of growing up.

Colds and other illnesses will occur and for some children it may occur more often (than many parents want). However, concerns about the overall heath of a child should be reserved for a pediatrician or medical professional.

Wash your hands!

To be very clear, hand washing is enforced at Garden of Learning Virginia simply because it works. Our children are conditioned to wash hands upon entering school, before and after eating, when coming inside from playing, blowing noses, and of course after bathroom visits. This also makes it easier for parents to reinforce these same healthy habits outside of school. Continue these sanitary practices at home by making time for your child to wash their hands after coming home from school (or outdoor event), playing with pets, before eating, after eating, and of course, after using the restroom. This small gesture contributes so much to the health of the community as well as our center and even more important the health of your child.

Know our center sickness policy—and honor it.

We understand that parents need to return to work and a sick child can be a real barrier. However, in our attempt to keep our children, staff and community healthy we have created a well-developed and fair policy on sick children that all families need to follow.

If you have any questions about our sick child policy please contact us.

Build your support team.

In the event that a child gets sick parents are responsible for having a back up plan. So start building a team of trusted caregivers who you can depend on in those emergency situations. Please make sure they are added to your authorized pick up list.

Good Nutrition is a must.

At Garden of Learning Virginia, we believe in serving nutritious foods and snacks. We serve fresh fruit with all meals and snacks. Boosting your young child’s nutrition isn’t always easy especially with the selective eating habits many young children experience. However, ensure your child gets adequate rest and as many whole foods as they will allow especially those packed with Vitamin C to build a healthy immune system.

Until further notice no visitors other than parents will be allowed in Garden of Learning Virginia even at pick up time. Our spaces will be reserved for teachers and children only. 

Thank you for helping to keep our Garden safe. If you have any questions, suggestions, or comments don’t hesitate to ask.

Latifah DeNully Privott

Director and Early Educator