A day care center is not just some place parents can leave their kids so they can concentrate on their own lives. A day care facility should be more than just a temporary place for the kids to be in when their parents are out to work, it should be a nurturing environment that will encourage development in the children cognitively and physically.Aside from displaying the foundations of reading, writing, and mathematics – meaning colorful letters and numbers plus an assortment of crayons and writing material – a day care facilitator should also inject an arts and crafts activity into their day care kid’s normal schedule. It does nit have to be everyday because some days you have to reserve for reading, others for outside play, maybe others for special trips to the museum or the zoo.
There are dozens of available help online regarding appropriate activities for day care aged children. All of these help in developing the child’s gross and fine motor skills, exercising their shoulders, wrists, and finger coordination.
Activities that build and develop fine motor skills usually involve a lot of folding, and gluing, and even coloring. You can try for example a simple butterfly-making activity. All you need to have are child scissors, a permanent marker (for your use only since you wouldn’t want your walls turned into a canvass), and different color wrapping tissue, contact paper, and yarn. You’ll need to either cut out the shape of the butterfly on the contact paper or have the kids do it, depending on their ages. The kids can then start tearing up the colorful tissue and stick the small pieces onto the sticky side of the contact paper, creating a sort of collage. Use the yarn to hang the butterflies by the windows. It is important to display the artwork so the kids can enjoy the feeling of fulfillment and can be proud of their finished pieces.
Aside from developing motor skills, doing activities such as arts and crafts help little kids develop a lot of social skills too. They learn to be patient in waiting for their turn. For example, if you are to group the children to about three kids at one table and you provide each with one set of crayons and a pair of scissors to do some artwork, they will need to wait until the kid holding and using the red crayon finishes so he can pass the crayon.
Activities like these can also encourage children to share. Inevitably some of your day care center kids will fight over that pair of scissors or the extra piece of yarn. The good thing about fights though is that you can use it as a discussion point for the kids to understand the value of sharing things with each other. You can say, “See, not sharing the scissors made both of them cry. Next time, so that we do not get angry or sad, let’s all try to share the things we have inside the room with our friends.”
Day Care Equation: Fun Activities = Happy Kids= Satisfied Parents = Profits for You
Your day care facility does need to have a set schedule for your children so they learn discipline and they learn to follow rules. However this does not mean that you will only have one routine to follow. Monotony in your center might make the kids not want to come back, which means lesser profits for you and lesser marketers too.
Here are some easy ways to make your day care kids’ days fun and exciting, a day that they would want to tell their parents about.
Arts and Crafts Time
Arts and crafts have been proven to significantly help in the development of a child’s motor skills. With the myriad of activities you can do, you can probably hold an arts and crafts class every single day! A good book on arts and crafts for kids would be really helpful for you. These books have activities that are age appropriate and will even instruct you on where to get materials you need. You will also get variations of the activities so you van repeat the same concept with a different theme.
Movie Time
Who says TV needs to be banned? There are a lot of educational materials you can choose from and most developers have already taken into consideration how these programs would affect young minds. Extensive researches have been made on these and your local government could probably even suggest a few good titles. You can also preview the material yourself and ask for inputs of the parents on the said activity.
Reading Time
Reading time could be done everyday before the kids take a nap. It is a good time cue that it is time to rest plus it encourages children to make reading books part of their habits. Story books and big books are very appropriate for day care kids since they contain colorful pictures that can interest young kids. Aside from that, these books are also made of sturdy material that can withstand the unintentional strains from young hands. You can even teach the kids decision making skills when you let them choose which stories to read. Aside from reading to them, have a stack of reading materials they can browse through independently.
Through the term of their stay, you will notice that the children will develop a love for reading. Let them join in telling stories that have become their favorites. They’ll probably start memorizing some of the rhyming words and this will make them immensely happy and confident. At some point, you will probably even see them pretending to read aloud like you. Encourage these actions with words of praises and hugs.
Language Games
Include songs, finger plays, poems, games, stories with alliterations, and rhymes in your daily activities. Children love repetition and patterns and these activities would help develop their cognitive skills.
Free Hands
Let your room be filled with writing materials that are accessible to the kids. Writing is a skill that will emerge independently and you wouldn’t want them scribbling all over the walls. Let them know early on that they need paper to write on and a pencil or a crayon to write with. Writing does not have to be formal letters and numbers; you can encourage children to doodle, draw shapes, and just practice their finger dexterity by holding a crayon and scribbling.
For more see: How to start a day care center
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