Castles and kings cont...

Castles and kings has been such a fun theme. The kids have really had a lot of fun. 

When introducing something new, I take out every item and explain how it works.

Water colors were something we have not explored this year so I was curious on how it would go. 

I showed them how to dip paint brush in water and then rub the color and rub on paper.

Success ! The mess was limited and the smiles were endless. The kids really enjoyed using water colors .

Block building is the all time favorite play area in the room. These 2 were building really tall castles on water ( or the Moat.)

So in the Funshine curriculum, it always has facts about certain topics we are talking about. Now, maybe I was the only one who did not know this, but castles sometimes sit in a small trail of water call the moat. Huh.... I never knew that. I always learn something as well using Funshine express curriculum. 

These beauty's are water colored castles we were working so hard on.

I am excited to finish the week up with more castle and King fun. 

 

Jewels and tea parties

Happy Friday friends!

We do not have much going on this weekend, which is rare. Any plans for you all?

This week we continued with kings and castles. 

Sometimes when I first introduce a theme at circle time, I am not quite sure if they understand what we are talking about,  but out of the blue, I will hear a child say, "I am a king" or "I wear a crown." 

This morning I had a parent at arrival time say that when she mentioned they were driving to Coles house, her son said "Cole lives in a castle" I enjoy hearing things like that. It confirms that I am teaching and they are learning.

To continue on with our theme. We had a tea party and took turns pouring the tea and passing the muffins around.

One of the games that came with buttercups curriculum was a crown and the children had to decorate the crown with jewels. With some games, I like to put them on the table and just observe what the kids do when they see it. Some will play exactly how it is suppose to be played, others will figure out another way. 

These 2 figured out right away to place the jewels in the crown. 

The shape of the month is a star. I like the star because it's everywhere. You look up at night and hopefully see an abundance of stars. 

At the beginning of each theme , there is a book list. 

Looks like this

I may not get all of them, but I pick a few that I think would be fun to read and  those I read all month.

The more repetitive with a book, the more the kids will get involved and will know what will happen next. 

For the star shape I choose this book

It's the song twinkle twinkle little star, but with some fun extensions. We look for the stars on each page.

Next week we will still be learning about kings and castles.

Ps: if you are wanting more info about Funshine express, just click here. 

Kings and castles

We certainly enjoyed the fun farm theme, but are ready to move in to Kings  and castles.

The first activity we enjoyed was making a royal crown. 

I have to say, this was a perfect activity because I live in Kansas City and we all know that the Royals took the Crown👑

Funshine express rocked with this one 😉

Yay!!! Anyway, it came at the perfect time.

 We finished them today.

One of the early math activities was a Old King Cole mother goose story/rhyme.

I put magnets on the back of all the story/games so that the children know it stays in the tray and it is easier to manipulate.

We counted the fiddlers, wondered why he wanted a bowl, what a bowl is used for, what colors were each fiddlers.

Because it is fall and there are leaf piles everywhere, Carter enjoyed sorting the leaves into different leaf piles.

Remember to follow me on Instagram @coleykidscreations and like my Facebook page. Coleykidscrestions

Buttercups

Happy Friday! Since we finished our curriculum, I thought I would do a post on what comes in the buttercups curriculum. If you followed along last year , I did a video on what came in the fireflies.

Buttercups is for ages 0-36 months.  

  With the buttercups, theme last 2 weeks instead of a month.

All of this came in the box. A finger play, games, sign language chart, attendance  circles and much more. 

These are the creative art activities. The have all he materials needed. The extras are glue, scissors .

With Buttercups, there is not a designated day to do these, where in he fireflies there are certain days.

Buttercups give 2 days to complete. We all know toddlers cannot sit for a long time , so breaking it up makes it easier to complete.

Funshine always provides 2 books that go with the themes.

Also 2 manipulatives come with curriculum. 

These rings are used to make a crown , 

but also they provide entertainment

 for the one infant I have. 

Somethings are the same in both curriculums, but Buttercups curriculum just had simpler things.

A fun fact that I learned from Funshine.

Buttercups is named after the flower buttercup which symbolizes "childishness"

Fun farm week 4

The kids have really enjoyed the Fun Farm theme. Mooing like cows, quacking like ducks, oinking like pigges, is so much fun. I have a Old Macdonald Cd and we play that on repeat all the time. They enjoy hearing all the animals make noise. 

Another activity Toddlers enjoy is peek a boo. The art activity in the Funshine express curriculum for this week was Peekaboo barn. 

These were so cute and playing peek a boo was even cuter.

The flaps on the side close and open. 

Another game that we have enjoyed playing and singing a song with is Barnyard Bunch.

This is the song we sang.

Sing to "Where, Oh where has my little dog gone?

Where, Oh where does the animal go?

Oh where is one that's the same?

Oh look height and low to see where it goes.

Find one that looks just the same. 

Things are a lot more fun when singing is involved. 

Did you know that Funshine has a faith based curriculum and a school age curriculum? A curriculum for every need. 

If you have not explored the website, I would highly recommend it! You will be surprised how much info and extra's are on it. 

Fall foliage

Happy Friday! Are you ready for the weekend? We have 2 birthday parties on sat and them my daughters is on Sunday. Busy weekend of celebrating.

We finished our week by finishing our fall foliage frames.

This has been my favorite so far. I am sure it will not be the only one.! Funshine has the cutest projects in the kit.

We picked flowers on our nature walk .

outside is such a wonderful way to get hands on with nature. There so much to see and talk about. As we walking, we noticed birds, squirrls, airplanes, leaves blowing, and then the purple flowers. That was the best part. Kiddos love to pick flowers. We smelled them with our noses and talked about how our noses are for smelling. One of my older toddlers said "look it is purple and a circle."

Why yes it is! The world is surrounded by so much learning.

The farm is one of the favorite things to play and I have had it out more because of the fun farm theme.

They love playing with animals with it .

Next week we will continue our fun farm theme with more fun projects and activities. 

Have a super weekend!

Fun farm fun

This week we mooed right into our fun farm theme. Get it?.... Ha! Anyway, this time of year is fun to talk about farms because the pumpkin patch is a popular place to be.

 One of my favorite things I love about Funshine Express curriculum is that I can save many of the games from previous years.

Lydia was singing EIEIO song while matching the farm animal shadow game . This game came in the fireflies curriculm,(3-5 years,)  but could easily be implemented for toddlers. I just put it on the table and waited to see how they would play with it. 

 A few matched the shadows, the younger ones just pointed to the animals and made the sounds. 

It can so versatile.

Since pumpkins are obviously are the thing right now , we enjoyed making paper bag pumpkins.

The toddlers love when they can use paintbrushes and paint. We dipped out brushes in glue and worked quickly to paint the glue in he bag. 

The next step was to rip the tissue paper and glue it on he bag.

I like to make up chants when steps are involved. 

For example,

For the tissue paper 

I would say " rip and stick"

Or for the glueing I would say " dip and rub."

This makes it fun and easy for learning the concept. 

Our beautiful pumpkins.