Shadow dancing is so much fun.

Hi! We have been a busy crew this week thus far. I will tell you one thing (there are quite a few) I love about Funshine is that there are plenty of activities to fill the whole day. When I planned without Funshine(cannot imagine at all) there would be a lot of gaps in the day that may not have an activity and that was a lot to plan. Funshine fixed that problem right up.

This week we are still learning where we live. I have  mentioned that some places people live is cloudy all the time. One of the children said "no sunny not ok." Well yes, it's not ok. When we go outside we never pay attention to what we see and  Amelia found her shadow. She stopped and said "look look" She was followering it around and moving to see if her shadow would do the same thing. I explained where we live is sunny now, but it may be cloudy the next day and the shadow will go away.

Sometimes when we think of homes, we only think of houses that people live in, but sometimes
forget the animals live in homes too, just different than ours.
 Animal homes was the creative Development activity for this week. The first day we colored our book and added stickers. We then placed the animal pictures on the homes where they live. ie... fish in a fish bowl, dog in a doghouse. The last step was putting it together like a book.
Each week I observe the children sitting longer and getting more involved in their work. Makes me happy that the seeds are growing into flowers.

On Thursday we will start our new theme Busy Mice. Be on the look out for a post with new and fun activities.

Wrap up for the weekend

Happy Friday friends!

Fall is in the air for sure. Falling temps at night, mums, football and fall festivals. Where we live, every year, there is a fall festival the last weekend of the month. Carnival rides, vendors galore, and so much more. The kids get so excited every year when they start seeing the trucks with rides pull up.

Since we have been learning about where live, we talked about the happenings and things that happen each season in different neighborhoods.

 I asked the parents if they could they could bring a family picture. I have gotten a few so far and I have taped on the wall. The kids will go over and point to the people in the family. I repeat the word family and siblings one day they will say it back!

In the Funshine express curriculum, one of the activities was to make circles with play dough. We made all different shapes. I pointed out that we had made circles because on was the outline of the shape.

 There was a house matching game from another activity and fun shine suggested taping craft sticks to the pack of them and make a neighborhood in sand. I decided to use play dough instead. It was easier for the littles to stick them in and  a little cleaner since we were doing it inside.

 We discussed that a lot of houses in one place is called a neighborhood.

I love how all of a sudden the littles will say something that was talked about in the past. They really  listen and soak it up!

If you are looking for a curriculum that is easy to follow and no planning, Funshine is for you. It makes my day so much easier knowing that everything is planned for me. The ideas that they have, are so creative and different. I would never think of something like that. It is great for homeschool, in home, preschools, daycares. Enough materials come for each child. If you want to learn more, follow the link,  funshineexpress.com Remember to follow me on Instagram @coleyclark30 and like my facebook page.

Family trees

This week we have been focused on our family. Who are the members and how many are in the family .

 I have asked the parents to bring in a family picture. The kids light up when they look in the wall and see mommy and daddy and siblings.

  I had mentioned in my last post that we started the process of making a family tree.

Today we finished them! We pointed to the names on the leaves and said them out loud.

The  shape of the month for the buttercups curriculum is a circle. I always try and think of fun ways to incorporate shapes and colors.

I found some balloons with circles on The . So it's double circles, a circle balloon with circles on it. It's a win win. I love when things work the way I want them to. 

In and out is a concept we have been learning about. Everyone time we go out tre door outside, we all chant "going out the door" when we are coming in, we chant "we are going in"

Toddlers love to repeat things over and over again so the golf pegs and wipe box was the perfect activity . 

That sums up our first half of the week and hump day. 

Remember to follow me on Instagram @coleykidscreations

Where we live

We finished up week 1 of where we live.

Since I have a younger crowd , the butter cup curriculum from funshine express gives 2 days to do creative art. 

 We started making "my home" at the beginning of he week and then finished it at the end. It gives more time to do it slow. 

I always feel it is the process and not the product. I love to see how each child does the same thing different. The finished product could look different for each child, but it's there creation.

Grandparents day was a couple weeks ago and the kids made these cutest "owl love you" cards. The beaks are placed on different spots. 

 It is so important for the child to take ownership and know that it is their own work and that they worked really hard on it. I will always show them an example , but never want it to look exactly like it. 

Funshine is so great because I can do any activity on any day. There is not a day by day lesson. If I decided to switch something around I could. Flexibility is key.

 

Amelia is matching the houses from the matching game I introduced.

Lydia is counting the friends that are here using the attendance chart that was included in the buttercups chart.

Where we live

Home  is a good place to be no matter what style or place it is in, it is how you make it on the inside that makes it home.

     We have started our next theme where we live. 

 It is amazing how houses can look so different even if they are right next to each other.

 I looked up houses on the Internet and so many popped up. Big, small, wide ,narrow and so much more. It was a really good discussion topic on the differences of the houses.

The topic card for this week is a picture of different colors and shapes and sizes and it started the whole idea of different living styles.

Funshine express has objectives for each section. For example, we did a match  the homes game provided in the Funshine express buttercups kit. The objectives were memory, exploration and emergent math. 

In the curriculum guide there is a section called learning goals and objectives. 

It is very simple to follow. I just match what is with the activity and the category that is under. 

This  helps me to focus on he children and observe and if I need to focus on something, I do extra activities to make sure they are matching the objective. 

Ok, enough with that info, it's just info I think you should know if you are thinking about this curriculum. 

This was a match the homes. I set them out on the table and just observed to see what the children would do. Most of them matched them, but others just looked. I plan on doing this everyday and see how different they play day by day.

For a cognitive activity, we are making  "my house". The first part was to color the square and then add a rectangle circle for the door.

Day 2 will be completing it.

We have been busy building houses with blocks and going in and out of he dollhouse.

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If you are new to my blog, welcome and hope you enjoy learning about Funshine express. 

I am also on Instagram @coleykidscreations 

Happy Birthday!

Happy Friday! 

We finished our Special me theme and will move on to where we live.

Happy birthday was a favorite song to sing the past couple days. One of the topics was birthdays. 

A topic card that comes in Funshine express curriculum is a really great conversation starter.

I have this hanging up on the wall and I love when the kids point to it and say "happy birthday cake"  I even heard one of them say "baby messy" 

In the kitchen area we pretended to bake a cake and a birthday party for stuffed dog.

With Funshine express buttercup curriculum a list of books are listed that go with the theme. 

This book was so cute that we read it multiple times and then did a worksheet that is extra on Funshineexpress. 

Grandparents day is Sunday sept 13th and we made a gift for the grandparents, but because I know some of them read this blog, you will have you wait for the post next week. I do not want to spoil it.

😉

Special me part 2.

Well how was everybody's long weekend? It is always to harder to get going on Tuedsay after a holiday than it is on a Monday. In my opinion. 

  The kiddos came back ready to dive into some Buttercup learning. This is our 2nd week for the special me theme. I love observing children after we have done activities at circle time, or read a book. They tend to act it out or pick up on it more. 

For example, last week I got a mirror out and we looked at our faces and pointed to our nose and eyes and mouth, and during free play I saw the kids looking in the mirror pointing to their face. How cool is that.

Funshine express had provided some cute easy activities for the toddlers to do.

Yesterday we talked about Birthdays and what birthdays mean. We sang the happy birthday song a lot of times.

The Cognitive Developement activity was to make a Birthday Windsock. 

I put a happy birthday song in and we used our wind socks to dance.

I am not sure about all kids, but I do  know the ones I have love to dress up. 

Funshine express provides games in he kit every month and the activity for this week was Dress up Game.

I cut the strips out on the dotted line and I like to magnets on back of games so that I can use a cookie sheet to keep it together. 

It's easier when the kids know that it stays right in the tray.

I took a video of us doing this at circle time . So hopefully you can get a little bit of how  game works .

http://youtu.be/Yz6KL1090yI

Buttercups

This year has been off to a great start so far. I am excited to be part of Funshine express and blog about all the fun things we are doing with the curriculum.

 This year I will be doing Buttercups. The ages are 0-36 months. I have mostly toddlers this year. So I needed a younger curriculum. 

 Buttercups is based on the learning curve of the ages. A calendar with numbers is not being used, but a attendance chart and a weather chart and shape chart are the resources. 

*disclaimer: I will have a better display wall, I just have to figure out what.

We will still do crafts and simple games,but there are 4 themes instead of 2 because we spend shorter time on each one. Creative art is not every day,where last year with fireflies it wasn't

The first theme is Special me.

The kids are loving looking in mirrors and seeing theirselves. I decided to have some fun and make silly faces in the mirror and the kids started doing the same thing, which is what I going for. 

While the kids looked in the mirror, we sang this song which was in the curriculm guide.

             To the tune of " Are you sleeping?"

          In the mirror, in the mirror,

            Look and see! Look and see!

            Who is in the mirror? Who is in the        mirror?

            Look! It's me! Look! It's me!

One of the great things I Love about Funshine is the kit always comes with books. The buttercups, have age appropriate hard books and a manipulative to go along with the themes. 

(The mirror was on the material list) which is also included. All the work is done for you, how great is that for the busy life we all have .

 One of the cognitive development activities was making a me puppet.

The activity is planned out with materials in the curriculm guide.

How cute are these? The kids loved looking in the circle mirror.

I am a huge fan of using trays. It gives the children ownership of their work and it keeps all the materials close to them and in a spot, rather than crayons and glue sticks rolling off the table.

I am looking forward to sharing all the activities Funshine Express has planned.

Check back later for more.

*if you are a new follower, welcome and hope you enjoy. Remember to follow me on Instagram for more daily happenings.

    @coleykidscreations