October started with beautiful, sparking sunny days and cool, crisp weather. This was just the right weather for lots of nature walks, and the children loved searching for colorful leaves as we rambled around the neighborhood and over familiar paths. The red leaves were the most popular, but the children collected a variety to wave around, watch blow in the wind, or to show to parents. Our nature walks include a stretch of flat tarmac, and the children love to run races and

The Blue Sky Daycare children had a wonderful time learning about flowers through a variety of activities, celebrating Cinco de Mayo and Mot

After the winter months have passed us by, the warmer temperatures and the warmth of the sun are most welcome! The children and I had a wonderful time this month exploring the changes that begin to appear around us as winter's snows are melted away by spring's bright sunshine. Since the snow melted, the children had a great time playing outside. Rain gear helped us all keep dry as we looked for the first green leaves. Our first discovery were the shoots of the hardy chive

The children and I kicked off December with a daily "Random Act of Kindness." For the fifteen days before our holiday break, the children and I committed to doing something kind for a range of unsuspecting people and animals. I decided on these specific actions with the developmental range of the children in mind in hopes that the children would be able to see a direct correlation between their kind actions and the effect they had on others. We began the month by simply gi

November started with some beautiful sunny weather that was perfect for planting some flower bulbs. The children loved the idea of "putting the bulbs to sleep" and covering the bulbs with a "blanket of soil" to tuck them in. Even though we will have to wait a long time to see the flowers, it's nice to know a surprise awaits us in the spring. November's weather was also quite conducive to nature walks, and the spectacle of falling leaves prompted the children to bring along

May's flowers arrived as promised, and we used them to make fabulous flower crowns to celebrate May Day. The children loved searching all over the yard to find cheerful yellow dandelions and got lots of exercise running back and forth with handfuls of flowers to give me. We couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day to celebrate high spring. Our outdoor explorations have gone beyond picking flowers. We have also enjoyed planting seeds in our flower garden and preparing t

March arrived in grand style with lovely warm breezes and a promise of spring. We made it outside as much as possible, especially celebrating the opening of the sandbox and mud kitchen. All the children learned about using the sand respectfully so everyone has a good time, and before long, the children were making cupcakes, pies, soup, and all sorts of other goodies in the kitchen and making mountains, ditches, hills, and roads in the sandbox. Outdoor time also focused on pl

February may be a short month, but it does not lack for holidays, and we celebrated! Groundhog Day: We started our day reviewing what we learned about hibernating animals in January. We came to realize that groundhogs hibernate, too, and if they come out early, it's likely that the cause is warmer weather (among other factors), and warmer weather means an early spring. The next thing we did was make a graphic organizer to show how many of us thought that the famous groundhog

I'm pretty certain that our enthusiastic celebration of the new year could've rivaled the revelers in Times Square! The children got lots of wonderful gross motor movement as they learned how to twirl can-style noisemakers. It was a little challenging to master the circular motion needed to make the noisemakers work, but once we figured it out, it was extra noisy fun! Taking big breaths and blowing hard were two skills the children worked on as we celebrated with roll-out pa

With December came the snow, and we had lots of fun playing in it We made snowmen, complete with pumpkin "crowns..." and snow horses fit for several riders! Like little elves, when we weren't playing outside, holiday crafts kept everyone busy. The children created a variety of ornaments to bring home and share with their families. Each activity honed fine motor skills. The crafts included skills like winding yarn around a form (it's tricky to put the right amount of tension

The waning light of November brought the children and I to a more introspective place, and through the month we worked on cultivating the little "lights" inside our heart as we practiced good manners, kind words, and gentle hands. We started our month with some fine motor skill activities, most notably playing with Tinkertoys. The children created their own structures with the sticks, wheels, tubes, and a variety of parts, then we worked together to make cars and a variety o

Today we celebrated Blue Sky Daycare's 5th annual Halloween party! The children and I had so much fun engaging in a range of fun and spooky activities! Once our usual morning routine was finished, we began our party with classic sensory game- the children took turns feeling some Halloween-themed items in a covered bowl. They felt "bat ears" (fresh sage leaves), "jellyfish pieces" (well-oiled noodles), "dragon eyeballs" (peeled grapes), and "monster slime" (pistachio pudding

This past week has been lots of fun! We've continued to work on our circle time fingerplays and the children are nearing mastery on their favorites. The children have also enjoyed creating some very simple games as their imaginations grow. The games range from pretending they are puppies to pretending a friend has fallen or is stuck in the mud. The pictures below show the children using teamwork to help a friend up from the "mud." I introduced the children to a story calle

The children and I had the chance to get in a spooky mood and use our senses to explore some creepy bugs, some real and some pretend. First, the children got to handle a range of rubbery, stretchy, sticky pretend worms, some big black pretend spiders, and some wiggly pretend centipedes. The worms were definitely the most interesting to the children. We talked about how the worms felt in our hands and practiced using the words "squishy," "stretchy," and "wiggly" to describe t

The children and I are really beginning to notice signs of fall all around us. The bees are slow and less numerous, the brightly colored leaves are beginning to fall, and the calls of migrating geese can be heard throughout the day. Our circle time aims to capture the flavor of the season, so we've included several Halloween-themed fingerplays in the morning mix. One of them is "Ghost of John." Sung in a minor key, it is particularly spooky sounding and goes like this: Hav

Our day dawned bright, sunny, and perfect for a picnic! During our morning routine, I shared the story of the origin of one of the most universal and comforting soft toys children enjoy. Just in case you've never heard the story behind teddy bears, here's a short (and true) story about how teddy bears came to be so popular. In 1902, president Theodore Roosevelt went on a hunting trip. Near the end of the trip, a black bear was captured. Roosevelt would not shoot it. Late

The children have been looking forward to picnic day all month long- it's one of their favorite events. We had so much fun and it began right after our morning routine with the classic memory game "I'm Going On a Picnic." It's lots of fun trying to remember what others said they were bringing and just as much fun to pick a silly item to add to the list. After our picnic game was done, the children prepared iced tea to bring with us on our picnic. We smelled the tea... ...u

We had so much fun celebrating Flag Day today! After calendar, weather, and circle time, the children and I looked at a picture of the United States flag. We talked a little about its features- its red, white, and blue color and the shapes of its stars and stripes. I set out a set of felt cut outs so that the children could build a replica of the flag. At first, we worked on it together. We talked about which way the stripes should go, where the blue rectangle should go,

We've had a busy week with lots of hush-hush Mother's Day projects going on. It's been tough to blog about things we couldn't talk about, so here's the rundown of our days leading up to our Mother's Day celebration on Thursday. Tuesday the children and I had a great time making special birthday cupcakes. Everyone got to take a turn helping out. One of the littles did a nice job dumping the dry ingredients in... ... and the big kids did a fantastic job pouring in the liquid

Celebrating Cinco de Mayo was tons of fun, and I'm pretty sure the kids liked the activities I planned. We ended up spreading the activities over two days since we ran out of time the first day. After our morning routine, the big kids and I worked together on scissors skills and cut construction paper triangles to turn into a colorful banner. We talked about the proper way to hold the scissors (thumb in the little hole, fingers in the big hole) and practiced the open-close-o