Printer Friendly Version - Donna May: Preschool Never Gets Old

The past 25 years have breezed by for CDE Preschool teacher Donna May. In a world that has seen substantial changes in that time period, she notes that much of what pre-schoolers want and need has stayed the same. Photo by Rita Christopher/The Courier

No matter what the newest fads and the most up-to the minute toys, Donna May says there are some time-tested favorites in pre-school that resist the pressure of current fashion. Children still love to build with Legos; they love to squish Play-Doh through their fingers; they love to hear books like Make Way for Ducklings, first published in 1941 and Harold and the Purple Crayon, which came out in l955.

Donna herself has passed the pre-school test of time; she has taught at CDE Preschool for 25 years—and she is not the longest serving staffer. Director and Head teacher Linda Hall has been at CDE for some 30 years. The preschool itself, founded in 1949, is approaching its 70th year in existence.

CDE stands for Chester, Deep River, Essex. The school is located in Deep River, where Donna lives.

Another thing that Donna says has not changed is the lifetime relevance of the kinds of lessons learned in preschool.

“You learn how to share and you share all your life,” Donna says. “And you learn how to be kind to each other.”

And she points out that preschool teaches another skill that never seems to get easier, no matter how old.

“You learn how to wait in line. That’s something you do your whole life, at the bank, at the grocery store,” Donna adds.

Donna now sees adults in the bank and grocery store in Deep River where whom she knew as pre-school students. At school, the youngsters call their teachers Mrs. May and Mrs. Hall.

Her name, she says, creates confusion in another way. People think Donna May is a double-barreled first name and sometimes ask her what her last name is.

Donna’s first involvement with CDE came when her own two children, now grown, were students. When there was an opening for a teacher several years later, she applied.

“I love working with little kids,” she says, adding that a preschool teacher has a special role. “You are the first [school] teacher that a child has; that’s a big responsibility.”

Donna and Linda Hall have worked together for so many years that Donna says that have a sixth sense about where each one is in the classroom and what needs to be done.

“It’s like an old marriage at this point. We kind of read each other’s minds,” she says.

And she says that like all teachers, both are always aware of where everybody in the classroom is.

“It’s like radar, teacher’s radar,” she says. “We know who to keep an eye on and who to let go; you know your classroom and you know your students.”

Donna says one of the keys to making a harmonious classroom is to understand the needs and behavior of individual children. She says the school does not believe in time-outs for difficult behavior.

“We gently redirect, gently steer,” she says, explaining that often the teachers will suggest a different activity to help a student get control of the situation. “There are no problem students; kids need time, love, and direction.”

And some children, she adds, just want the teacher to sit quietly with them for a few minutes.

“Being quiet can be just as good as teaching tool as talking,” she observes.

Donna grew up in Milford and still recalls visits for Sunday lunch to her grandmother’s house in Norwalk. It was always a big Italian meal, but Donna says the noodles were never called pasta, always macaroni. And the marinara was never referred to as sauce, but gravy.

“I just started calling it sauce so people would know what I was talking about,” she says.

She moved to Deep River when her husband Brian worked for Uarco, a company that has since left the community. Brian, who later worked for the telephone company, is now retired and drives a school bus.

“I love Deep River,” Donna says, “and it doesn’t hurt that I have a 30 second commute to work.”

In the summer Donna has time to indulge her passion for gardening and she uses her own home-grown parsley in her sauce. On a summer morning, the best place to find her “in horrible clothes” is out weeding.

She brings her love of outdoors to preschool where she says unless the temperature is freezing, the kids bundle up for outdoor play.

“Playing like that is such an important part of childhood,” Donna says “And [the children] never want to come in.”

Outdoors is also the place for nature lessons, looking at leaves, birds, and insects and walking over to the pond at Fountain Hill Cemetery. According to Donna, that walk, monitored carefully by teachers and volunteer parents, is almost like a parade.

Over the years Donna says she has a heard many droll comments from her young students that she would love to share with a visitor. But she can’t.

Donna says she is sometimes amazed at how much time she has spent at CDE and how quickly it has gone.

“It was 10 years and the next thing I knew, I looked up and it was 25,” she says.