Learning Through the 5 Senses!

Our pumpkin patch is open, and our little learners are enjoying hands-on opportunities to explore the sights, sounds, smells, textures, and tastes of the season.

Our young scientists have been investigating pumpkins using their five senses! 👀👂👃✋👅

What did we discover?

Sight: We observed pumpkins of different sizes, shapes, and colors. We noticed their stems, ridges, and unique features.
Touch: We explored the pumpkins’ smooth, bumpy, firm, and sometimes rough surfaces. With teacher guidance, we also investigated the stringy insides and slippery seeds.
Smell: We took a closer look at the way pumpkins smell, especially when opened!
Hearing: We listened as we tapped, knocked, and gently rolled pumpkins, noticing the different sounds they made.
Taste: When a safe, prepared pumpkin food was available, we had the opportunity to explore its taste. We talked about how pumpkins can be used in different foods.

As the children explored, they practiced describing what they noticed, comparing similarities and differences, asking questions, and sharing their discoveries with friends. These simple, playful experiences help build curiosity, vocabulary, observation skills, and the foundations of scientific thinking.

Connecting Our Pumpkin Exploration to TNELDS

Our pumpkin investigation supports the Tennessee Early Learning Developmental Standards (TNELDS) through meaningful, hands-on learning experiences.

These standards encourage children to learn by doing, wondering, observing, and communicating their discoveries.

Little Hands & Lasting Connections

Every Monday at The Academy of Indian Lake Village, we look forward to welcoming our friends from Legacy Village in Hendersonville for a special time of stories, coloring, conversation, and connection!

These intergenerational visits are about so much more than sharing a book or creating a colorful masterpiece. They give our students the opportunity to build meaningful relationships across generations while learning valuable social and emotional skills. As our little learners listen to stories, practice taking turns, share their artwork, and engage in conversations, they are strengthening their language and literacy skills, expanding their vocabulary, developing fine motor skills, and learning the importance of kindness, patience, and respect.

And the benefits go both ways! For our friends at Legacy Village, spending time with young children can bring joy, companionship, meaningful social interaction, and opportunities to share stories, experiences, and wisdom. The laughter, little conversations, and proud show-and-tell moments create connections that enrich everyone's day.

We believe some of life's most valuable lessons happen when generations come together. Our students are learning that friendships can look different at every age, that everyone has a story worth sharing, and that even the smallest act of kindness can make a big difference. At AOILV, we're not just learning and living — we're building a school family that reaches beyond our classroom walls. Here's to making Mondays more meaningful!

Traveling Through The Alphabet

We didn’t just learn our ABCs this month—we lived them! 💛

Our ABC Countdown immersed our students in the alphabet through themed days, hands-on activities, creative play, and plenty of opportunities to learn through play. From A to Z, every letter became an adventure!

We connected our activities to Frog Street and the TN-ELDS, making sure our learning was purposeful while still being FUN. We even carried our alphabet learning into the kitchen by incorporating letters and themes into our menu!

This month was a perfect example of what we believe at AOILV: learning doesn’t have to look like sitting at a desk. It can look like building, creating, moving, tasting, exploring, laughing, and playing with our school family.
💛🔤✨That’s the AOILV way: Learning Through Play!

We Matter! 🧠💛

Friday was a little different at the Academy! Our school was closed so our incredible educators could spend the day learning, growing, and investing in themselves.

We welcomed back the amazing Colleen Schmidt for a powerful professional development day focused on something that could not matter more: how our presence in the classroom helps wire a developing brain for success.

As early childhood educators, we have an extraordinary responsibility. The experiences, interactions, conversations, encouragement, and connections we provide during these early years can have a lasting impact on how children learn, grow, communicate, regulate emotions, and understand the world around them.

One statistic from our day really stopped us in our tracks:

More than 60% of IQ is developed before a child turns 5 years old.

Every conversation.

Every book we read.

Every question we answer.

Every hug.

Every moment we get down on a child's level and truly listen.

Every time we encourage them to try again.

WE MATTER.

Our teachers aren't supervising children. They are creating environments where developing brains can thrive. They are building relationships, creating meaningful experiences, modeling language, encouraging problem-solving, and helping children develop the skills they will carry with them long after they leave our classrooms.

🏆 A Summer Worth Celebrating!

This summer, The Academy of Indian Lake Village took home TWO incredible awards! 🥳

🏆 Best Leader

🏆 Best Community Visibility

We are incredibly proud to serve the Hendersonville community and to be a school that doesn't just care for children, but actively invests in the families, educators, and community around us. We have had a blast at The Summer Concert Series!

And if you know Ms. Morgan, the Best Leader award probably comes as no surprise! After receiving the Energy Award last year, she has continued to bring that same energy, positivity, and passion to our school every single day.

She starts everyone's day with a smile—and that smile is contagious. 💛 But great leadership isn't just about the person at the front. It's about building a team that believes in the mission. Ms. Morgan has led this incredible teaching team to become the team with the highest QRIS score in Hendersonville! That achievement represents the dedication, intentionality, and hard work of every educator who walks through our doors each morning.

Friday reminded us why professional development matters.

The awards reminded us why our community matters.

And our classrooms remind us every single day why early childhood education matters.

Alien Invasion!

Our little learners had an out-of-this-world time celebrating Alien Invasion Day! 👽🛸

At The Academy, we proudly embrace no screen time for our students, but we also recognize that technology is an important part of everyday life in 2026. Our teachers used ChatGPT as a creative teaching tool to generate imaginative alien images that helped bring the day's theme to life and spark conversations, creativity, and pretend play.

The technology stays behind the scenes—the learning, laughter, imagination, and hands-on play happens in the classroom! From becoming little aliens to exploring an alien invasion together, our students showed us just how far their imaginations can travel. 🌎➡️🪐

Who knew learning could be this out of this world?! 👽✨

Color Explosions

Our students put on their white T-shirts and headed outside for a colorful adventure!

Armed with colorful powder balls, our little artists turned the playground into their very own canvas! They tossed, laughed, played, and watched as their plain white shirts transformed into bright, colorful masterpieces. 🎨💥

It was messy, creative, and SO much fun! We love giving our students opportunities to explore creativity through hands-on play—and today was definitely a day to wear the art home! 🌈👕✨

MESS FEST: Playing the Day Away!

If there’s one thing we know how to do at the Academy, it’s PLAY! And during our Play the Day Away week, we took play to a whole new level with our epic MESS FEST! 🤪
Our little explorers jumped right into a sensory-filled experience featuring shaving cream, a pool of Jell-O, a paint slip-and-slide, frosting painting, mud, oobleck, and even a chocolate waterfall! 🍫🎨

Every messy activity gave our students an opportunity to explore different textures, practice creativity, experiment with cause and effect, and—most importantly—have FUN!

Sometimes the best learning happens when children are given the freedom to get messy, get curious, and simply PLAY. MESS FEST was the perfect reminder that childhood is meant to be hands-on, joyful, and a little bit messy!

Because at the Academy, we don't just talk about playing the day away… WE LIVE IT! 💦🫧🎨🍫