Praying & Playtime = Learning Time

Praying

Over the last few weeks I have heard the same prayer suggestion multiple times. Pray about the little things in your life along with the big things in your life, and be specific. I was reminded during Gayle's Mentor Moment that we have such a great opportunity in our daily activities with our little ones to teach them how to pray, and to pray often. Being with my children throughout the day provides me with many moments to teach them that God loves them and cares about their daily joys and struggles. So today was a good reminder for me to also pray during the day and try to be a good model for them. It doesn't take more than a moment or two to sit down and pray or have a conversation with God.

Playtime = Learning Time

Erin Keeney was a great speaker today and gave us lots of very useful information and tips to help our children along in learning new words and how to communicate. My very favorite quote from Erin came right as she started her presentation... "Motherhood is the hardest job I'll ever love." This quote struck me because I've never heard it put that well before. At the end of the day, I love being a mom and wouldn't change it; however there are also the parts of the day when you are being pulled in 8 different directions and are exhausted. Motherhood is a very hard job, but there is no job more rewarding that when you see the sweet smiles on your kids faces, or they come up and give you a great big hug.


Instead of trying to recap all of the specific speech information that was given today (hopefully you picked up the flyers on the back table), I thought I would include some of the tips, tricks and other tidbits that were shared today:

 

 

 

Places to take your children that have many opportunities for learning:

*Library - look at books, learning the rules of being in a library, story time
*Pet Store - learning names of animals, sounds, what they eat & where they would normally live
*Cover's Apple Ranch http://coversappleranch.com/
*Micke Grove Zoo http://www.mgzoo.com/zoo/micke-grove/default.htm
*Fresno Chaffee Zoo http://www.fresnochaffeezoo.org/
*Oakland Zoo http://www.oaklandzoo.org/

Ideas for playtime:

*Rotate toys - child can focus on one toy and not be overwhelmed by all the other toys spread across the room, new excitement when toy is brought back out, less toys to clutter house

*Suggested toys - avoid electronics(batteries are expensive), Mr. Potato Head, Legos, blocks, Play Dough

*Another resource suggested by Angie - http://filefolderfun.com/

*Teaching words in categories: for example - farm animals, people, sports, bath time, bed time

Praying we were all encouraged today!

Cyndi