Thompson Early Learning

Preschool Registration for the 2026-27 School year is open! Our program inspires a love of learning and nurtures creativity, confidence and social emotional growth through a balance of play, open-ended exploration and guided instruction, including:

🌳 Outdoor learning adventures
🤝 Group learning & free play
📚 Literacy & numeracy activities
🔬 STEM & sensory exploration
🎨 Open-ended art
🎵 Music & movement

Spaces available in select schedule options.

Contact our Preschool Coordinator at [email protected] or (604) 238-8497.

What a fun and refreshing activity for a hot day!

The children enjoyed taking their creativity outdoors as they explored painting on ice cubes. Using a variety of bright colours, they painted directly onto the icy surface and watched with excitement as the paint spread, mixed, and changed. They were fascinated by the different textures and enjoyed observing what happened as the ice slowly began to melt.

To add another layer of discovery, the children sprinkled salt onto the ice and carefully observed what happened. They watched as the salt helped the ice melt faster, creating interesting patterns and tiny channels for the paint to flow through. The children were excited to see the changes and shared their observations with their friends.

“It’s like snow!”
“It’s melting.“
“The salt disappears in water!”
“It looks like an ocean.“

This unique art and science experience encouraged creativity, sensory exploration, curiosity, and early scientific thinking. The children loved experimenting, making discoveries and creating colourful artwork while staying cool on a warm sunny day! 🌞

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Looking for a rich early learning program filled with hands-on exploration, creativity, and play? At Thompson Early Learning's Rompers Preschool, children build confidence, make friends, and develop early literacy, numeracy, communication, and social-emotional skills through engaging, play-based experiences.

Registration is now open for:

🌈 Licensed Preschool Summer Camps
📅 Week-long camps: July 20 – September 4

🎨 Licensed Preschool Program
🗓️ September 2026 – June 2027

📞 Contact the Preschool Coordinator at 604 238-8497 or visit www.thompsonearlylearning.com to register or learn more!

Our little scientists explored a sink-or-float investigation! 💧🔍

The children were invited to make predictions about a variety of objects, including a wooden block, stick, pebbles, flower, ceramic cup, and football.

🗣️ “I think it will float!”
🗣️ “No, it will sink!”
🗣️ “The rock is too heavy!”
🗣️ “The football is big!”
🗣️ “Let’s find out!”
🗣️ “It floated!”
🗣️ “I was right!”

Together, we tested each item and carefully observed what happened. The children compared their predictions with the results and shared their thoughts and ideas with one another.

This hands-on science experience encouraged curiosity, critical thinking, observation, and problem-solving skills. Through exploration and discovery, the children learned that an object’s size doesn’t always determine whether it sinks or floats!

We loved seeing their excitement as they investigated, questioned, and made discoveries together. 🌿💧✨

🌼🌸🔬 Science in Bloom! 🔬🌸🌼

This week, the children recently explored a beautiful science experiment using white carnations and coloured water.

The children were excited to watch the clear water change colour as we added a different colour to each vase. We purposely left one flower in clear water, and one child quickly noticed and asked, “What about this one?” We explained that leaving one flower in clear water would help us see how the flower started and compare any changes. We asked the children to predict what will happen next:

“The water will be purple!”
“It’s going green!”

With our timer set, we began observing and the children predicted how long it will take to see any changes in the flowers:
⏲️“It’s going to be 13!”
⏲️“Hm, 15!”
⏲️“I think it will be 30 minutes.”

The changes took much longer than expected, making the results even more exciting! Over the next few days, the children carefully observed the flowers and excitedly shared their discoveries:
🩵 “Wow! The flower is blue!”
💜 "I like the purple one!”

Through this experiment, the children learned that plants drink water through their stems – like drinking through a straw. The coloured water traveled up the stem and into the petals through a process called capillary action. Just like through drinking straw, the plant pulls water upward against gravity from the roots, through the stem, and to the leaves and flowers.

This activity encouraged prediction, observation, critical thinking, and patience(!!) while helping children develop an early understanding of how living things grow and survive.

A wonderful experience filled with curiosity, discovery, and scientific learning! 🌈🌸

“When you take it out, it melts!”
“It’s magic!”
“It’s sticky!”
“It’s just melting in my hands!”
“It’s so gooey and bluey!”

Another fun science experiment at preschool! 🌟

The children got their hands messy while making Oobleck using just cornstarch and water. They were fascinated by this unusual mixture, which felt solid when squeezed and flowed like a liquid when released. Through hands-on exploration, the children observed, questioned, predicted, and discovered how Oobleck changed depending on the pressure they applied.

This sensory science activity introduced important concepts such as the properties of matter, changes in materials, texture, viscosity, and cause and effect. It encouraged scientific thinking, problem-solving, and curiosity while strengthening fine motor skills and sensory exploration.

There were plenty of giggles, surprises, and discoveries along the way—because learning is always more exciting when you can touch, squish, and experiment! 💙🧪✨

The children have been very interested in bugs during outdoor play! As they dug around the playground and in our garden, they discovered worms, centipedes, and roly-polies and ladybug grubs! To support their curiosity and inquiry, we added magnifying glasses, binoculars and bug holders to our outdoor environment for further exploration and closer observation. 🐛🔍🪱🔎🐞

We then brought their curiosity into the classroom by creating a bug provocation table filled with informative posters, books, bug pictures, and bug X-rays on the light table. The children also explored creativity through bug-print process art activities. 🪲🎨

This ongoing interest has encouraged observation, questioning, creativity, and a deeper connection to nature through hands-on, child-led learning experiences. ✨

A very special visitor day at preschool! 🦆💛

One of our preschool families brought in ducklings from their annual chick hatching project, giving the children a wonderful opportunity for hands-on learning. The class observed the ducklings up close, learned about what they eat, and noticed how they interact with one another. There were so many thoughtful questions, gentle observations, and moments of wonder throughout the day.

Experiences like these help children build curiosity, empathy, and a deeper understanding of the natural world. Thank you to this wonderful family for sharing such a memorable learning experience with us!

At Thompson Early Learning, we take pride our gardening program with the children. In both the classroom and preschool garden, the children are experiencing what it means to grow their own food first-hand.

In the science corner they learn about parts of a plant and enjoy compare various plants with pictures in books and posters, and learn about the stages of plant growth.

The children learned how to plant from seed - and patience that comes in waiting for a plant to grow! They sowed different kinds of seeds, including grass, peas, radish and a variety of flowers. Once ready, the children transfered the plants they grew from seed to the preschool garden, and planted other wildflowers carrots, brocolli, lettuce, kale, cucumber, and tomatoes.

They also pruned various herb that were planted in years past, like chives, mint and oregano, and water them regularly. The strawberry and blueberry plants have grown, and are already blooming, with "baby" berries coming in!

Everyone is excited to watch everything continue to grow, and together we are taking wonderful care of the garden, watering every day. 🌱🍓🫐

To learn more about our fabulous preschool program contact Anna, Preschool Coordinator, at 604 238-8497 or visit thompsonearlylearning.com

📚✨ What Does “Reading” Look Like in Preschool? ✨📚

It’s not about reading every word on the page.

It’s about…
.little hands learning how to hold and to open a book.
.turning pages gently.
.noticing details in the pictures.
.recognizing text direction.

It’s also about…
.making connections to what children see and experience.
.fostering social-emotional development.
.asking questions.
.creating stories from their imagination.
.exploring where a book can take them.

At this age, reading is about fostering curiosity, creativity, confidence and a love for storytelling.

Because every child’s reading journey – AND story - is just beginning. 💛📖