Tips to prepare your kid for first school

If your child is 2+ and if you are planning to send her to a playschool, here are some useful tips for their preparation to make their journey comfortable. School is totally a new environment for kids as they meet new people and make new friends. Changing the atmosphere at home to resemble that at playschool before they start going, will help children in adjusting well in their first school. Getting used to school depends upon the toddler’s nature too. Some take just one day and some a month’s time.

 1)      Talk a lot about the school: toys, games, children, teacher, outdoor games: Create an enthusiasm in the kid for the school by telling her about the playschool. Visit the school and make a note of all things that are going to amuse your kid. Let your kid know about the toys, colorful pictures, see-saw or slides that are available at the school.

2)     Show her school going kids: Introduce her to some elder kids who go to school. You are lucky if you know children going to the same playschool. Let them talk to your kid about the excitement they have at school.

3)    Introduce them to books: Buy colorful board books and make them acquainted with pictures of animals, birds, vegetables, fruits and alphabets. They will be interested to find the same in playschool too.

4)    Create a routine and change their timings: Children should be made to change their routine at home according to school timings at least fifteen days before they start going to school. Wake them at a time suitable for going to school at the right time. Change their diet timings according to the lunch or snack timings at school. Sudden changes in timings of rest and food will add to their initial resistance to school.

5)   Play CDs: Children usually at playschools are taught rhymes etc by playing different animated CDs. As children love animations, play some CDs at home and tell them that they can have more of them at school.

6)  Visit the school a few times with your kid: Take her with you to the school a few times before her first day to school. Make her acquainted with the teachers, so that she does not find them as strangers on the first day.

7) Leave them at someone’s place: Try to leave them at a friends’ or relative’s place for a few hours for a few days so that she gets used to staying without you. She will know that you will be back in school after sometime. This will decrease separation anxiety.

8)  Try different food items: Make her taste different items and varieties and see what she likes best. In this way you can be prepared for making arrangements for their tiffin box.

9)  Buy new items for school: Take her for shopping and buy all new things like bag, shoes, tiffin box and water bottle and tell them they can use them on their first day to school.

10) Be with her on the first day: Many playschools allow parents to stay with their kids on the first day. You can spend some time with her and show her the toys, outdoor games and introduce her to other kids in the school.

What ever the preparation may be, children do cry on their first day to school. After all, they are being left at a place full of strangers when only you mean the world to them. It is a common site to see mothers shedding tears after sending their child on the first day to playschool. This is all about “letting go” thing. Fine with it, just do not show your emotions to your kid. Remember that it is only a temporary phase. 

Visit http://www.indianplayschools.com for list of playschools in hyderabad, list of playschools in Mumbai, list of preschools in Delhi, Chennai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Pune

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What Can The World Wide Web Do For Children’s Education?

The World Wide Web is among many other things, a learning resource full of material that can enhance children’s understanding of their school subjects and of the world among them. There are thousands of education sites and a multitude of related sites that both parents and children find useful.   

The World-Wide-Web is packed with children’s games that can enhance their learning capacity in a fun filled environment. In the process of having fun, they begin to develop and learn useful skills they need for their education. Online games can stimulate children from four up to seven years old. This inventive technology can help your child develop learning and understanding skills.   

You have all kinds of sites from bright and breezy interactive sites to those that will help your child prepare for high school. As well as being fun, using the internet for education equips primary age children with learning skills they are likely to use throughout their school years and beyond.   

The internet is a valuable aid to learning and study. In addition to helping with research for everyday schoolwork, students can find lots of useful material that relates to preparing for college. Certain sites offer the chance to look up the information that you need to do homework or to complete a special assignment or project.   

You can also take part in question and answer sessions and chat with other students online. For history, current affairs or health, you can find a wealth of sites on almost any topic. For math, there are also many sites. Language students can hone their skills by reading online foreign language magazines, and everyone can find resources to help with all areas of study.   

Parents still have to worry about chatting online because it could be addictive to a child. If you allow your children to chat to other students on the web, it’s sensible to limit the time they spend doing so, as you would do when they are on the telephone. There are several online timer programs that help you keep tabs on time spent chatting. You can even set an alarm to go off when your chosen budget has been reached.   

With the increasingly popular social networking sites like Facebook, Bebo and Twitter, children have inevitably been consumed- as have we all. Children can often put themselves in a cyber world of danger which could affect their real world, so it is important that parents are aware of this and monitor accordingly. Psychologists and neurologists believe these sites to be doing more harm than good.   

The flexibility of online education has opened up the doors of education to people from all walks of life. Stay at home moms and dads can now study from their own houses and employees can complete their assignments around their work schedules. There is 24 hour accessibility to the study material allowing for all night study sessions as well as the possibility of returning to subject matter again and again if necessary. And as universities continue to expand their options, the flexibility of online education will only increase. Students will be offered more options with the possibility of a custom created curriculum that suits their individual requirements and interests.

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You Need A Day Care Business Plan To Open A Profitable Daycare

Any business that is just starting out needs to develop a business plan, however, when you are opening a daycare center it is especially important. Because there are so many different laws and regulations regarding child daycare, it is critical that your daycare business plan covers everything.

Your daycare business plan should incorporate the all state and federal guidelines as well as any licensing requirements for teachers and employees of your daycare. This area has the toughest laws of any business because it deals with children, and each state has their own laws and regulation regarding daycare. Read the rest of this entry »

MOE contributes to Child education development in Singapore

Pre schools, kindergarten and nursery schools are aiming for new heights today. The Child development program and orientation process has been discovering new ways to train the best. To what extent these efforts are effective and innovative? Can we add more value to their upcoming projects? How relevant these initiatives are for their great endeavour?

Before coming to the criticism part let us have a quick look on the Kindergarten and Primary education facilities of Singapore. Ministry of Education (MOE) primarily controls the development and monitoring activities for state schools and private schools. There are differences on autonomy, funding, course curriculum, tuition fees and admission procedure between these two levels of schools. Voluntary Welfare Organizations (VWO) partially funded by MOE run Special education (SPED) schools for children with disabilities. For Singapore citizens expenditure in education sector comprises of 20% of annual national budget. This serves state education and government aided private sectors. For homeschooling also exemptions are allowed. English being the primary language for children which is being taught from pre school stage.

Kindergartens provide 3 years education to children aged between three and six. These are termed as Nursery, Kindergarten 1 and Kindergarten 2. There are more than 200 kindergartens registered with MOE. These are run by private sector, community foundations and business groups etc. Primary education is divided into two stages Foundation and Orientation. Foundation stage is a four year programme (Primary 1 to Primary 4) and  Orientation stage is for two year (Primary 5 to Primary 6). Primary education is compulsory and tuition fees in Singapore are free of cost up to this level. But monthly SGD 13 is being charged as miscellaneous costs.

 At the end of Primary 6, National Primary Schools leaving Exam is being held to determine whether the student is good enough to leave primary school and apply for secondary education.

 Home tuition Singapore is considered as an additional help for the parents seeking to improve their children’s grade and attain complete private assistance. Education policies are favouring meritocracy, the ideology to identify and nurture young students for leadership positions. Financial Assistance Scheme (FAS) programme provides financial help to low income families having household income less than SGD 1500 or SGD 1800. Even every year Edusave Merit Bursary (EMB) is provided to about 40,000 students born in poor families. Ministry of education conduct exchange programmes with 120 primary and secondary schools in Singapore. Through this students get chance to visit overseas schools in ASEAN countries like China, India etc.

Krishna Swaminathan an eminent mandarin tutor in Singapore shares his expert views on Singapore education beneficiaries. Find more information from MyprivateTutor.sg an online tuition agency in Singapore.

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Marketing 101 – Effective Ways To Market Your Daycare Services

Marketing a daycare business need not be an expensive exercise, if managed effectively. Your marketing budget can be as expensive or as cheap as you wish for it to be. That said, sometimes it does pay to invest a little more in marketing to ensure greater returns. Remember not to fall into the trap of being “penny wise pound foolish”. Here are a number of suggestions to help you market your daycare centre:

1. Marketing collaterals / Direct mailers

Direct mailers are very important marketing tools. They need not be flashy. A simple flyer telling your audience about your centre and what you offer is good enough. Read the rest of this entry »

YOUR BABY CAN READ–Really??

As an experienced parent of 6 children and grandparent of eight, I’m really skeptical l about any product that claims to teach your baby to read.  It seems like the proven method of teaching reading ability to your child has always been to start reading to them at an early age, and then introducing them to phonics.

WHOLE WORD RECOGNITION

I recently saw a product “Your Baby Can Read” on an As Seen On TV spot. It’s unique in that it’s the first reading program combining videos, flash cards, books and other aids specifically designed to help teach infants and toddlers how to read.  This       “YOUR BABY CAN READ” program was developed by Dr. Robert Titzer of Southern Louisiana University, and has been featured on Good Morning America and other national TV shows.

I bought this set of videos for my daughter’s 22 month old, Heather, on the trial basis of $14.95 just see if it had value. My daughter told me that the first starter video immediately made Heather take notice.  Heather seemed to be really interested as the words appeared in the videos; the movements of the words and the accompanying music really caught  her attention.  My daughter said it’s probably the first time that she’s seen Heather show an interest in anything for more than two minutes. I guess having the words demonstrated by children in the short videos may have something to do with it, too.  

The “Your Baby Can Read” process uses many proven learning tools:

• Repetition:  Each word is on the screen multiple times and in different fonts

• Sight:  An arrow scrolls under the word from left to right as the word is read

• Sound:  The music background added to the repetition of the word is another learning key.  The background music uses happy songs like “If You’re Happy and You Know It”, and others to make this sound like a “happy” time for her.

SEEMS TO HAVE VALUE
Before I spent the $200 for the whole set, I went over to take a look for myself.  Sure enough, Heather was enjoying the DVD, trying to mimic the movements of the children and beginning to mouth the words as they appeared.  I did order the Your Baby Can Read set, but I made my daughter promise that she would also introduce the phonic learning system to Heather as well.  I heard there is an excellent site for phonic instruction, starfall.com, and suggested that to her.  So now, Heather gets to watch the YOUR BABY CAN READ DVD every afternoon, and soon will progress to the second disc.  Her verbal skills have increased and she does recognize and say several of the words.  I just hope this technique gives her the desire to become an avid reader, something she will enjoy all through her life.

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Admired Educational Kid Toys For Today

Parents may not spend a heap of time pondering upon the make-believe educational toys they provide to their children, but perhaps they must start. A closer examination at play time shows that totally different types of toys stimulate completely different sorts of child development.

A seemingly realistic function-wise operating cash register is integrated with a solar-powered calculator that can accommodate real-size dollar bills The bigger than normal sized buttons and a giant number display makes it appropriate for various levels of educational learning ability. The toy comes with plastic coins, play bills, make believe credit cards and different accessories

Electronic educational toys are flawlessly adapted to the kid’s age and talents/inabilities. Toy makers are very careful about the age they suggest for his or her toys, as kids too old or young will lose interest quickly (and as a result not learn something). Additionally, toys created by companies like Vtech and Leapfrog can help kids with learning disabilities to learn at their own pace, in a custom atmosphere (their home) most suited to their learning needs.

To please both parent and child, look around for nice toddler books. Books created particularly for toddlers are usually ones created from chunky cardboard. They may have pop-up characters, animals with fur that kids will pet, and flowers with a scratch-and-sniff scent. It is necessary for parents to scan to their youngsters to introduce them to language and ideas, and additionally to instill a sense that reading and learning are important. Books conjointly give nice bonding moments between parents and children.

Remember not to overdo it. Sure, it is tempting to strive and single out the most important and best gift that will be at the party. It is forever flattering when the birthday boy or girl latches on to the gift you presented, and barely lets go long enough to finishing opening the remainder! However, the size of the gift and the amount of cash you spend is not as vital as the influence that your gift could have on that exact child. Select something that can incite their minds and encourage their development.

Costumes are the ultimate pretend toys for role playing. Costumes like cowboy clothes for boys and ballerina costumes for girls take them directly into the make believe realm where their dreams all come true.

Jigsaws encourage hand and eye co-ordination. These come as wooden or in huge pieces for this age range. Many of the puzzles have lift out items with pictures beneath to assist children of this age obtain object recognition skills, manual dexterity and form matching skills.

The Best Toys R Us is the premier resource for cash register toys and educational kid toys. Click on the links to visit the website.

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How to Attain Grants For Your Childcare Facility

It is a fact that each year the US government is providing grants for businesses and developments and daycare is one of the businesses that applies to this grant. So, if you are seeking for finances for your daycare, you can try applying for grant money. The good news about this is that you do not have to pay back the money. In wanting to start a daycare business, you need to have the finances for it, if you do not have enough savings to put up your own business, you can seek for grant in order to make your dream of starting a daycare business come true.

One of the sources of money grant is the government. Actually, it is not only the government who offers money grant; there are institutions, state, local, federal, and private that offer grants. Read the rest of this entry »

Need Ornaments for your Tree? Try These 2 Simple Crafts for Kids

Christmas is a holiday where all kinds of kids crafts are created at home and in the school environment. Crafts for kids, however should be an activity that should bring fun and excitement to children’s activities aside from adding a bonding to the adults that are doing the projects with them. Educational arts and crafts is a way of doing crafts with children where they are not blindly copying the adults model but are creating things that they are capable of creating at their own developmental level. When children create at their own level a number of things occur. It creates a great feeling about themselves, as who can feel good about crafts projects that are copycat models of someone else’s. Children who create their own projects without adult input feel much better about themselves. A further benefit educational arts and crafts gives children, is its allowance for so much more creativity. There is very little that represses creativity more than having to copy anothers work. Educational art encompasses a few different types of activities. There is the cafeteria style that allows children to choose materials to work with, there is process only art where the process is what counts along with a few more. The point of it is that all of the crafts under educational arts and crafts should be age appropriate, and allow for freedom of creation and expression. Below I will give you 2 clear cut, almost effortless Christmas craft ornaments that you can make. The first one uses plastic throwaway cups: The children will now love to color their cups using only permanent markers that work on plastic. Try to get the kids to cover up the cup with markers as much as they can. When they are done, take a cookie sheet and put the cups upside down on it and put in the over at around 350 degrees. Watch them melt in the oven for a few minutes until they are the right size that you like. Make sure you keep a close eye on them so they don’t totally burn up. The cups and the tray of course, get very hot so the children must be kept away until they cool. When they are cool, make a hole in the center and use colorful ribbon to hang as an ornament for your tree. For our next craft you will use any unused or not needed dvd’s or cd’s. Next step: Give the kids all types of things to decorate them with and them string them up on the tree. There are loads of ways to decorate the cd’s. You can color with permanent markers, glue and glitter them, collage over them, decoupage over them, and decorate them with whatever shiny, decorative materials you can find. Once they are done, get some pretty ribbon and hang them from your tree. If you want to see what a crafts acitivity done in the cafeteria style is like then check out this Hanukkah Crafts collage

Christmas is a holiday where all kinds of kids crafts are created at home and in the school environment.

Crafts for kids, however should be an activity that should bring fun and excitement to children’s activities aside from adding a bonding to the adults that are doing the projects with them.

Educational arts and crafts is a way of doing crafts with children where they are not blindly copying the adults model but are creating things that they are capable of creating at their own developmental level.

When children create at their own level a number of things occur.

It creates a great feeling about themselves, as who can feel good about crafts projects that are copycat models of someone else’s. When the crafts project is totally created by the kids themselves, it makes them feel much better about themselves.

Creativity is also a wonderful reason to switch to educational arts and crafts.

There is hardly anything more that cramps a child’s creativity than being expected to totally copy and adults rendition of a project.

There are between 4-6 kinds of art type of activites listed under educational art.

There is the cafeteria style that allows children to choose materials to work with, there is process only art where the process is what counts along with a few more.

The point of it is that all of the crafts under educational arts and crafts should be age appropriate, and allow for freedom of creation and expression.

Explained below are two simple and inexpensive Christmas crafts activities that you can make from items around your home.

The first one uses plastic throwaway cups:

Offer the kids permanent markers in many colors for them to decorate their cups. Encouraging the children to color all over the cup will make for a nicer ornament.

When they are done, take a cookie sheet and put the cups upside down on it and put in the over at around 350 degrees. Leaving them in the oven between 2-3 minutes will allow them to go down to a good size. Keep an eye on them so they don’t disintegrate in the oven. This part must be done by adults only as it gets very hot.

When they are cool, make a hole in the center and use colorful ribbon to hang as an ornament for your tree.

The second activity is a neat way to use all of your old, ready to throw away cd’s.

Next: Add lots of decorative materials and get them hung on the tree.

There so many methods of beautifying the cd’s.

You can color with permanent markers, glue and glitter them, collage over them, decoupage over them, and decorate them with whatever shiny, decorative materials you can find.

Once they are done, get some pretty ribbon and hang them from your tree.

If you want to see what a crafts acitivity done in the cafeteria style is like then check out this Hanukkah Crafts collage

Faige Kobre is a former teacher and director of Early Childhood Education. She is the founder of The Educational Art Institute which teaches adults how to teach children art and give crafts that raises self esteem, teaches thinking and problem solving skills and explodes their creativity. kids crafts projects ideas for self esteem and creativity

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5 Simple Activities to Help Young Children Develop Friendship Skills

The first thing I teach young children is personal space. As a dance educator, it is more then just “keeping your hands to yourself” but understanding what exactly is space. For example, some children like to talk close in another child’s face, other’s will instinctively grab a friends hand or sit on top of another child. Some children do not have an understanding of their bodies and when they play they easy knock into others and are considered “rough.” When the child’s whose space is inadvertently being squished speaks out the squishier can interpret this as the child does not want to be play or be friends.

This can be the furthest thing from the truth but teaching children about friendship is more than using kind words, sharing and good manners. It is also about respecting boundaries and space and achieving a certain level of body control. Think back to your own personal relationships. How do you feel when you are in a conversation with a close talker, or on top of someone in a tight elevator? A certain amount of control is lost. Your body is constricted and it reflects how you feel. The same is true of children. There are simple games that you can do with children to teach them about personal space, the space around them and how they move their body through the space. Try some of these ideas out with your children or students and watch as their understanding of their bodies change and the concept of friendship develops beyond words.

 1. Have every child start in their own special spot. They can use “magic glue” to glue to the bottoms of the shoes to the ground. Ask each child to take their most favorite food out of their pocket. Let them describe it to you. If they need help prompt them. Some good examples are: sticky, gooey cheesy, melty pizza. crunchy popcorn, wiggly spaghetti, and/or jiggly jello. The more descriptive words the better. Now have them pretend to eat it and follow the journey of the food as they swallow it and the jiggly jello jiggles down their throat, jiggles in their bellies and jiggles to the bottom of their feet. Maybe the sticky, gooey pizza travels around their ribs and to their arms. This exercise begins to teach children that we have space inside our bodies. Food gets chewed up and travels through out our body as energy. They can experience the inside of their bodies through a visual and kinesthetic experience. They can move inside their body without traveling from their spot.

2. Every child should still be in their own special spot. They cannot move their feet from their special spot but they can reach and stretch with their arms in any direction. Let them explore the space around them, above them ,under them, beside them. Let them explore the close space around their neck, behind their knees, under their chin and reach as far away as they can as well. Space is not only inside them but always around them as well.

3. Now we are ready to move through the space. Make the movement boundaries very clear. You can use cones or painter’s tape to mark the movement space on the floor. I usually make a rectangle or square and call it our movement square. We have a defined space and are not to go outside the space. Now that the children worked on moving their bodies in their spots, remind them they have control of their bodies and the space around them. Start slow and have the children walk around the space. They may be close or far from another person but may not touch. This game gets better the more they practice. Have the children meet very close to the center of the space without touching and then get as far as they can from each other. They are becoming aware of their own space and others. After they have mastered walking you can add other steps like galloping, skipping, jumping and jogging. You can move sideways through the space, and carefully backwards through the space as well.

4. Kids like to touch each other. With permission and guidelines gentle touching is a great way to connect to each other. When they are comfortable moving through the space, add touch to the experience. Yell out two body parts like “hand to hand.” The children need to touch a child connecting with their hands. “Hand to foot” would be two children touching one hand to one foot. Other fun ones are hip to hip, hand to knee, elbow to knee, back to back , etc.

5. Lastly, see if they can put some of these concepts together. In groups of four or more see if the children can created a shape together that explores space. They can reach in high, middle or low level, they can be close or far from each other, they can choose to touch and they can choose to move their shape through the space. Team work is involved, muscle control, spatial awareness and body awareness.

 After working on these activities, a gentle reminder about space when a child is sitting on top of another child or talking very close to a friend will take on new meaning. These kinesthetic exercises give children the practice they need to become better friends; understanding space, boundaries and gentle touch. It gives children ownership of their bodies, the space around themselves and others. Have fun learning with and through the body, developing connections and helping the little ones in your life develop friendships.

Stacey is the Founder and Director of Leaping Legs Creative Movement Programs. The focus of Leaping Legs is to help people regardless of age, experience or ability, become educated about their movement potential, develop kinesthetic awareness, and become more physically fit and healthy together as a family, and community. Leaping Legs promotes its goal through its original Up Down & All Around DVD, teacher training, and school and community workshops. The Up Down & All Around DVD received Dr. Toy’s 100 Best Children’s Products 2009 Award and 10 Best Active Products 2009 Award. The DVD has also been featured in many magazines including Dance Teacher and Dance Retailer News. In its August 2009 issue, Dance Teacher called the DVD “an essential tool for teaching the fundamentals of movement with daily adult-child interactions.” For more informaion on Leaping Legs Creative Movement Programs check out www.leapinglegs.com

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