Heart day!

Yes, I am mean. I don't let my classrooms celebrate Valentine's day. I do this for several reasons: 1st, it is to commemorate a religious saint!!! I have to keep religion out of it; therefore I can't teach the children the real history of this holiday. 2nd, do I really want all those kids bouncing off the walls on candy?. 3rd, Valentine's day is supposed to be a day that celebrates love and a day for lovers; well, do the children really love each other? They aren't even developmentally able to for friendships, no less love! and so the reasons go on and on.
What do I do instead? Well, my two year old class is talking about mail and where does mail come from? And how do you mail a letter? And if we time it right, they get to see the postman deliver our mail and maybe even ask a few questions.
My 3 year old classroom is talking about the colors red, white, and pink. We are mixing red and white to make pink; we are hunting for things around the center in those colors, and they are dressing in those colors to come to school. This will also lead to making patterns by standing in line according to the colors in our shirts.
The Pre K classrooms are writing letters to another center to create pen pals. They will get to mail these letters out themselves. So, we are practicing our writing skills, plus learning a new form of writing skill: writing a letter.
So you see, we still do something special, we just leave the Valentine's for the parents and home.