Category Archives: Education

Education

Printable Activities For Toddlers

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There are lots of different activities that are appropriate for toddlers. The best thing about toddlers is that they are very easy to engage and entertain. While some of the activities could be physical, a few involve printable artwork. Most of these printable activities for toddlers test their artistic skills and orientation. Printable activities also teach children concentration, dexterity and improve their cognitive development. Here are some of the printable activities that are appropriate for toddlers.

  1. Colouring Craft. This is the most common form of printable activity. The best part about colouring craft is that it can represent any theme or goal that you are seeking. It’s also possible to have it designed to match the age-appropriate cognitive challenge for the kids. Colouring craft is the best form of printable challenge that can be matched for any age from 2-10. Colour matching is such a stimulating assignment for most kids.
  2. Drawing. This is the second form of printable art. Toddlers can be given an assignment to draw particular object or time. They can also be challenged to name individual items that have been drawn on a sheet of paper. Just like any other printable, they are easy to manage and administer to toddlers. The best part about it is that there are lots of sites online with a variety of printables for kids of all ages.

III. Joining The Dots. Joining numbered dots is easier than drawing an item or image. It works particularly well for the younger children who haven’t developed their drawing skills yet. Joining the dots can involve even higher-level complex images that are above a kid’s intelligence or understanding. Sometimes the dots can be numbered to make it easy for the toddlers. The dots can also be left blank, and the kid has to figure out which dots to join before the image starts making sense.

III. Filling Blank Spaces. Words can be printed on paper with certain letters missing. The kids are then supposed to figure out which letters have been omitted and fill them up. This is often more enjoyable when the cluster of words involved are pretty similar. For example, the group of words could be names of domestic animals, house items, stationery or parts of an object.

  1. Grouping Items. Grouping of items is such an exciting and engaging form of activity for toddlers. Lots of things can be drawn on a piece of paper, and the kids are then asked to list them in order of relations. The clusters could be wild animals or objects whose initial letter is the same. It could also involve items that sound similar in their pronunciation. The most important thing to note is to always to make sure that the particular printable craft matches the level of cognitive development for the kids involved.

Child Care Options And Economic Impact

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As child care desires for families are as different as the families themselves, parents require a wide variety of child care options. The “right” child care option for your family would actually depend on your work demands, the ages of your children and your own special preferences about what is the most excellent care situation for every child. You would need to consider when you want care, the program’s distance to your home or work, the qualifications of the staff and prominently, the exclusive needs of your child.

Child Care Options

  • In-home care

In-home care is when a child care provider comes to the family’s house to offer services. This offers flexibility to the parents and gives personal concentration for the child. Please note that under most situations, a child care provider in this situation is considered an employee and employment and tax laws apply.

  • Pre-school Programs

Many public schools provide plans for four to five year old kids in playgroup Singapore. Programs are only available in the day and works on a school calendar. These plans are synchronized by the State Department of Education.

  • Nursery Schools

Nursery schools are group plans, which are not in someone’s house and operate for less than four hours per day. Many of these plans work on a school calendar and frequently offer both a part time and part week choice to families. These plans are not necessarily synchronized. However, many plans willingly follow the State Education Department Guidelines or become synchronized as a child care center.

  • Legally exempt Providers

It is other wise know as the “informal provider” care, these child care providers are normally friends, relatives or any other neighbors who watch one or two children, including their own. These child care providers are not necessary to be regulated.

  • Economic Impact

Concentrating on both conventional child care services, as well as plans more related with early education, the report by Economic Analysis of the Early Care and Education Sector documents the size, range, and economic breath child care. This citation stated that the early child care and education industry produce over 4.6 billion dollars annually. The sector employs almost 121,000 workers in more than 21,000 child care industries, serves more than 621,000 children and assists more than 751,000 parents entering and remaining in the workforce. It is obviously an important part of the New York Child Care State’s small business base, which deserves a stronger economic-development focus. Investment within this sector would not only advantage the formation of the New York Child Care future workforce, but would promote local economic development.

Tips for parents who have genius or gifted toddlers

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There are situations where you might have noticed that your child has the ability to learn faster than others who are in his age group. For instance, you might have noticed that he started to walk or talk sooner than his or her other siblings, as well as other kids in the surroundings. You might have also noticed that he was able to recognize and learn about certain things faster as a toddler. Having this type of gifts is a privilege and you have the opportunity to help them maintain these characteristics. Here are some tips you can follow to maintain, encourage and enhance the ability of your kids if you have genius or gifted toddlers.

Recognition

The first step to maintaining the genius abilities of your kids is by recognizing it. In most cases, there is always something extraordinary about a kid and parents must put in place some efforts to recognize such things. There must always be one or more things that a child is able to do that others are not able to do, at the same age.

For parents who are too busy and cannot find out these things, they could approach the teacher of the child as most teachers are always able to notice such abilities, since the child spends considerable time with them on a daily basis. Furthermore, the teachers also give tests and assess the children.

There are also instances where such abilities could come out and look negative, such as a child that is always troublesome and disrupts the class. This could mean a lot of energy, which, if carefully harvested and channelled towards positive things, could bring out a lot of great reward.

Encouragement

When parents notice these traits in their toddlers, they should try to encourage the child in those areas. For instance, if you find out that your toddler seems to have a genius ability with numbers, you could get them mathematical puzzles for kids and other fun games that have to do with numbers. This will go a long a way in enhancing their genius ability. Furthermore, if you notice that your child has a lot of energy and is using it to cause a lot of trouble, you could try to enrol them in an enrichment class for toddlers where they would be taught sports and gymnastics. Your child could be trained to become a world class runner, footballer or table tennis player in the future.
Nurture

As you encourage the child to continue to practice and display this ability, it is also vital that you nurture the ability. This could be through personally organizing an enrichment class for toddlers where you teach the toddler more about his ability. If you do not have the time or ability to do this, teachers who are good in this area could be employed to train the kids. This would help your toddler become an expert in this area before they are through with school and they could decide to make a career with the ability.

The What, the Why and the How of Planning Social Interaction for Kids

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Social interactions are at the heart of healthy, all-round development of children. They play a vital role in helping the kids form an identity, a sense of “self”, in terms of the expectations others have of them. Social interactions are also the breeding grounds for communication and social skills, as well as motor and cognitive skills.

* What does social interaction mean for young children

For the first couple of years, parents and the immediate family are the only people with whom a child interacts. This is both desirable and beneficial. However, after a certain age parents should introduce other people, ideally kids of the same age, to their children. The aim is to lay the groundwork for the child to start recognizing the desires and feelings of other children, to see things from the perspective of other children, and to learn to compromise. In the lack of appropriate social interactions, toddlers often grow to become selfish, self-centered, and less equipped to function in social settings.

After crossing the two-year landmark, children start benefiting from social interactions. The good news is, around this time, simple group activities such as participating in children’s playgroups is all the social interaction they need. As they grow older and start school, most become able enough to pick their own playmates and conduct their own social interactions.

* Why it is important for parents to facilitate social interactions

Research confirms that kids who develop social skills early in childhood grow to have higher confidence, stronger self-esteem, and greater willingness to participate in things happening around. They wade through their pre-teen and teen years with relative ease (because of their ability to make friends and to “be accepted” easily), and higher academic success. As young adults and later, fully-functioning adults with their own families, these kids are more healthy (yes social interactions can actively boost physical health in adults and seniors!), happy, and fulfilled.

Even if you do not want to think so far into the future, you will be able to find several compelling reasons to promote social interactions between your child and other children of the same age. For instance, early development of social skills prepares your child to understand the need and master the art of sharing, negotiating, cooperating, helping, finding help and so on. This will be beneficial both at home (with siblings) and at school (with school mates).

* How you can source fruitful social interactions for your children

One of the easiest things you can do to help your child interact more with other children of their age is to accompany them to play-dates and children’s playgroups. A children’s playgroup is better of the two options because it provides interactions with a larger number of children and parents. Be sure to choose such a children’s playgroup that allows an adult to be present, and you won’t have to worry about your child’s safety or security as well.
Children Playing In The Room
As your child interacts with peers, stands or sits together, laughs, plays, shares toys and has fun at the children’s playgroup, social bonds are built. They perceive the fun in playing alone versus playing together. They learn how to behave properly with others so that friendships are made and kept. They develop all social skills ranging from communicating clearly, effectively, and respectfully, or being considerate of others and cooperating to being assertive about their needs or desires when needed and controlling the same when not needed.

But that’s not all. Attending children’s playgroups also helps in the physical development of your child, by stimulating both the body and the mind. The benefits are just numerous!