Reading Aloud

Reading to Children has always been a highlight of our day. No matter what the schedule holds, we always have time for a story. It's just the way it is.

 

Lately, those children who don't fall asleep as soon as their heads hit the sack have been very receptive to my chapter book reading.

 

We started with some short stories from fairy tale collection books. These are Huge, Thick books that have some stories that are appropriate and some that are just way beyond their years. So I select the ones they'll hopefully love and leave the rest for another age group (summertime and school agers)

 

But it's been fun grabbing their attention right before they doze off to sleep.

 

This one was copyrighted 1991. We have diligently read each of the stories for the last few weeks.

Of course Princess stories are favorites.

 

 

This book was one of my favorites from childhood. My 3rd grade teacher ironically was named Edith White and I thought for the longest time she wrote it.

 Imagine my horror that she did not. :(

We have read the first 4 chapters so far and I have once again captured their eagerness to see what happens next.

 I Love My Job!!!

 

 

Does Reading Aloud Really matter?

                                                                   Click and see for yourself.

 



Gracie's FairyTale

A fun end to Gracie's Party:

Miss Gracie turned 5 this week!!!
We had a lil' birthday concert style party with a new microphone gift addition for her to enjoy at home. Little did we know, Mom had purchased a Pink guitar too.
We also played some games like "stick the jewel on the crown"

And the Birthday Feelie Bag was a hit....Everything in the bag was "Party" related.

• A Birthday napkin
• A Party Hat
• A dessert cup
• A spork (recycling those take out restaurant items)
• A Styrofoam bowl
• A Birthday Card

And the "Singing" was grand!!! Happy Birthday Gracie!

An October Saturday

 

Can you guess where I spent a day last Saturday?

Traveled to Springfield for a childcare training with my

Food Program Reps.

Their theme was pretty darn cute.

 

This is a folder full of ideas & recipes.

I'll be sharing :)

 

 

Can you say Door Prize Winner???

 

(Yes, took this pic yesterday.)

 

 

While we were gone, my daughter thoughtfully purchased an item for the children.

Thank you Rachel. It's adorable.

 

Can you say Golden Glove Winners??

The Royals had 3 announced yesterday!!!!

Pretty awesome dontchathink?

 

Molina is still my favorite catcher in baseball.

Alas, sigh, he's a Cardinal.





It's October!!

Monday began with making a scarecrow.

Ours is donning a Garfield shirt. Thanks Mr. Ron for the donation.

We caught a tomato worm and planned to feed it for a few days. But it had other plans......

It made its cocoon and so now we wait and watch.

Have you ever painted on paper towels?

 

The highlite of the week was Macoy's #2 Birthday party.

We had to go with a Farm party.

After all, our letter of the week was "F".

 

Sorry if the sideways pic makes you dizzy. Imagine how the "bowling pins" feel

 

 

 

 

Mrs. Wishy-Washy is a favorite.

 

 

Macoy's gift set the theme. A gator with sound buttons.

 

Mom & Dad will know where he is :)



 

Sharing a Link

I want to share this link to a Moving Smart article.
It talks much the "Academic Creep". Parents want their children ready for Kindergarten and that is understandable.
 But I will warn against the movement towards learning Only letters and numbers.
Education is so-o-o-o-o much more.
And I quote:

Early childhood learning is a personal, follow-your-nose journey of play and exploration with no other agenda than what's fun and fascinating right now. That's nature's educational plan. In fact, a three year old's brain is far more receptive to learning from mudpies and monkeybars than ABCs and 123s right now.

Of course, gently introducing them to new things they haven't found on their own is a great way to expand their learning horizons. But expecting them to engage or "perform" academically or in any other arena, is another matter entirely. They'll do their best to oblige us, of course, but if they can't, all we're doing is setting the table for unnecessary stress and frustration.

 

So before you try to "keep up with the Joneses", Ask yourself, is it good for the children?

The pic here shows a 2 year old and 4 year old using multiple tools.

With interlocking cubes, they:

1.  measured lengths of table and objects
2.  filled spaces (dinosaur footprint)
3.   used cognitive skills (sorted colors)
4.  used large muscles (hammered the blocks)

Not to mention they colored around the cubes and the dinosaur you see here.

All these skills prepare their fingers for using that almighty writing tool,

The Pencil.

 

ATTENTION:

This is what Play looks like!

 

 

 

Cooking Monday

Today is Monday...

& we're cookin'!!

 In this pic the kids are demonstrating how Popcorn  "PoPs"!!

Did you know you should not cook popcorn 100 calorie packs the same amount of time as regular sized ones? 

They Will Burn :(

 There are Oreo Cookies in that bag. They are thankfully egg free & peanut free

 for our little guy who can't have either.

This is what Popcorn cookies look like. I would recommend not using regular chocolate chips but stick with candy melts. 

But they taste good anyway!

Ingredients:

1 snack size bag of popcorn

1/3 cup of chocolate chips (that will melt in the microwave)

4 smashed up Oreo cookies

A large ziplock bag to do your hammering

Stir them up & wait for it to cool.

A Letter to The President

Monday is Presidents Day, the day we celebrate our country's founding fathers.

So we decided to get a jump start this morning on a bit of talking about what we would do if we were president.

This led to a brainstorm of what we think we would want to say to the current president in a letter from the children in our home daycare......

It's said that a letter will get us stickers & such.

What a great motivater!!!

Here is our version.

I hope you'll enjoy their thoughts

We adults have much to talk to our children about.

So....

Talk With Your Children.....A Lot

Two January Parties

January has been full of birthdays! We had 4 in our family and 2 in the daycare!

For the daycare setting we celebrated with some of the following activities:

 

A "What Will I Be?" Poster. This one is for the 1 year old.

An Artistic Rendering of the 1 year old with a life-size body tracing.

A game of Musical Hats. Who needs chairs???

& everyone loves dress up here!

These are the front & back of our latest game.....

Flower Action Beanbag Toss.

Toss a beanbag onto a flower and perform the action.

Special thanks to this website for the Birthday Memory game. Kids Sparks 

had this download available for free.

The ever-so-popular Pin the Jewel on the Crown. Repeated with the 5-year Old party.

Notice we wrote each child's name on each sticker as ownership is so important in the early years.

Of course what would a party be without Pizza?!

Our homemade variety on bagel thins is pure awesomeness.

Not too hard to chew and just the right amount for a good serving.

Cooking together is a great learning experience you don't want your child to miss out on!

Each child's name is written on the parchment paper underneath each bagel for more of that ownership.

Easy clean up too!

The newest addition to our parties this year will be these

Time Capsules.

(thanks to my father-in-law for the Christmas Card boxes)

With Sarabeth's we included her:

• What Will I Be poster
• Body tracing
• Pictures of the party
• Box label of her treats she shared
• Her crocheted Birthday Crown (my first attempt)

Wishing everyone a blessed 2013!!!!!!!