Preparing a Toddler for a New Sibling A new baby brings big changes to a family. Parents of young toddlers will need to do a lot of preparation before the baby comes and their attention becomes consumed by the newborn’s needs. Understand that c hange can be difficult for older siblings. They may...

Pretend Play is Serious Business! PIC is known for encouraging children to learn through play. In the Caterpillar infant/toddler room, the children learn through pretend play every day. Pretend play requires children to use their imaginations. Through pretend play children develop essential social...

Surprising Young Teachers Every Friday is surprise Friday for the Dragontails and Starlights. The activities can be anything from an adventure to the laundromat, to group games, to a new glitter craft. On a recent Surprise Friday, the Starlights planned a special activity for the Dragontails. The...

Watch Us Grow! There is no question that a whole lot of growth happens in and around PIC! The obvious places to look for it are during transitions when children move from one classroom up to the next, when a PIC family adds a younger sibling to their clan and then to one of the infant rooms, or when...

Facing the Fussy Eater Toddlers can display some pretty irregular eating habits. One day they like certain foods you serve, the next day they don’t. Toddlers may not eat a certain kind of food at home, however eat the very same food in school. Many toddlers would rather drink their meals throughout...

Exploring the Great Outdoors Outdoor play is an excellent form of exercise that promotes health and nourishes physical development. It offers a completely diverse environment for children to learn and explore. Playing outdoors allows children to develop muscle strength, coordination, and also self...

What You Might NOT See at PIC... but look closer! Dear PIC families and friends, I recently visited an infant/young toddler classroom and witnessed what I felt was a beautiful interaction between one of the teachers and a 3-month old baby. As many of the children were having a morning snack and a...

Learning About Community Helpers Recently, the Leapfrogs helped decide what their next topic of learning would be. After the teachers offered some suggestions, we all took a vote and brainstormed together about community helpers that we all knew. The children showed great pride in their decision...

Helping Children Learn Through Play In the Fireflies, we kicked off the year by investigating the jobs that the children act out during free play. We began by talking about their fee play experiences during morning meeting. We made a graph together of jobs to learn about. As we were talking, we...

It Might Get Loud! Recently, I read an interesting article written by Roberta Munoz entitled, It Might Get Loud: Tips for Setting Limits with Toddlers. In it, the author talks about how toddlers are very ego-centric. At this point in their young lives, they cannot understand that others might have...