Published: 4/14/2016 11:04:49 AM
Each spring, to celebrate the national Week of the Young Child, Northampton’s public schools join with the Northampton Parents Center and the Coordinated Family and Community Engagement program to throw a festival at Jackson Street School.
The gym is filled with all kinds of “brain building” games and activities put together by the city school’s Early Childhood program, along with many of the area’s private pre-schools.
And outside, kids can get their first up-close look inside a real fire truck, police car, dump truck and school bus — probably the most popular attraction.
This year’s celebration may have been the biggest and busiest so far. According to Barbara Black, Early Childhood Coordinator for the Northampton Public Schools, it was attended by more than 300 kids and 200 families — and it only lasts two hours.
The event was purposely crafted to have a broad appeal with a minimum of strife: For example, there is no food, so no worries about allergies, and nothing to buy.
Black likes to point out, “There’s nothing parents have to say ‘no’ to — nothing you have to have a power struggle about. It ends at noon, so we go home, eat lunch and take a nap.”