pg. 30: “Play may be the work of children, be we, the teachers, sometimes lose patience with what happens when the characters become too “heroic”. In theory such play is fine, but the dramas that erupt can be loud and messy. By the mid-eighties we were trying to transform the children’s work into projects and learning centers hoping the players would not detect the differences. It made us feel like real teachers when we controlled the topic, and we seldom borrowed our themes from the children’s play.”
p. 34: Elie Wiesel once said, “God created Man because He loves stories.” And children, we might add, learn to play because they love stories.
p. 46-47: It turned out to be not so much the “academics” we were adding but the time we subtracted from the children’s fantasy play that would begin to make the difference…….. Although we feared the influence of tv, we were cutting down on the one activity that counteracts the mindlessness of cartoons. We blamed tv for making children restless and distracted, the substituted an academic solution that compounded restlessness and fatigue…… by the 90’s, a “chicken and egg” dilemma became apparent to me. Since the earlier we begin academics, the more problems are revealed, were the problems there waiting to be discovered or does the premature introduction of lessons cause the problems?”…. We no longer wonder “Who are you?” but instead decided quickly, “What can we do to fix you?”
p. 72 “Everything we add to the mix along with play further advances learning. Drawing, clay, books, music, games, and dance suggest by a few areas of enrichment. However, it is the child’s ability to play in a sustained manner that makes sense to other children, which opens the gates to all other pathways.”
p. 73 “How do we extend the fluency of our teaching so that the art of teaching is in harmony with the art of fantasy play? How can the process even begin without belief in the potential of children’s play? Our visible support is required.”
p. 75 “Children will seldom sabotage their own plans if we give them a chance to find the way out. Bad guys turn into heroes and naughty kittens swim to an island, while a bear cub, a queen, and a swan are intergrated into the same story…. Preschool playwrights are as eager as their Broadway counterparts. A major difference is young children do not need a final product as proof of achievement. The children want to discover what the next question might be before receiving too many questions from grown-ups.”
p. 102 “Every day brought me new evidence of the preeminence of fantasy in children’s thinking. It has reinforced my certainty that we perform a grave error when we remove fantasy play as the foundation of early childhood education.”
p. 111 “How easy it is for us to dismiss the children’s play and stories as irrelevant make-believe and how children’s creativity is eventually picked off by adults belittling and correcting till the child’s tree is no more.”
“How fortunate to be a teacher present at the creation and ready to carry on while the children revise and replay the endless possibilities suggested by a magical tree and a little bird who had the keys to the kingdom”
Ok, I basically do… kids take breaks, they need alone time to reset and recharge, and they get a “time-out”… I just don’t give them in the typical sense many of us received them and therefore, many of us do with our littles. Being little is messy. Adulting is hard!
It is 8 vs 1 in this house 40+ hours a week so of course I have to separate my littles from intense situations. But I don’t say the words, “You are going to time out!” with any power or strength. I used to, I used to yell (more… trust me, I still lose it once in a while!) But when my 20 month old son would get mad and yell at me, “Go to time out! Go to time out! GO GO GO!” It didn’t feel right (Though it was tempting to follow his orders! It is us who needs to go to time out when we are going to lose it!)
I have two fundamental goals for my littles everyday. They know these goals as I tell them daily. (Old habits die hard! I used to have to say the goals I had for my middle school students daily.) I am here to respect you and protect you!
And I have two fundamental beliefs about littles regarding those goals. Number one, they mirror us, they say and do what we say and do. If I respect them, they respect others. If I keep them safe, they learn to keep themselves and others safe. Secondly, for a child to thrive, trust and play deeply, they need to feel safe. WORDSANDACTIONSAREPOWERFUL. If we give energy and lectures and labels to behavior we don’t want repeated, our littles will do the same. If we control, threaten, shame, well, you get the picture what they’ll do. We do what we know, but if we really think about it, “time-outs”, lectures, yelling, threats and trying to control someone else’s behavior does not work well in the long term. It can work in the moment and trust me, I’ve resorted to a few of these in desperate situations, but it doesn’t spread change, respect, love, safety.
So what do I do and try to say? First, I take care of myself with recharging time, personal development, good sleep, nutrition, and I workout daily with a community for my aggression release! (Curious???
Join me here!) Next, I am always repeating these
mantras and working on my mindset. I know the things they do are developmental, are impulsive, and they will grow out of them. And I believe they will grow out of them faster with less energy and with skills to handle their emotional honesty with appropriate tools. And I believe they know exactly what they did was wrong, so I focus on what they could do instead.
I say over and over again, calmly and confident while blocking and stopping them, “I keep friends safe, I won’t let you….hit, kick, take toys” (Again all very developmentally communicative normal milestones society may not accept but in littles it is their communication. We can’t take it personally!) Or I calmly carry them and give them a room or a space they can potty talk or scream all they want where it isn’t scaring a baby or hurting our ears during meal time.
I admit, I wait as long as possible for them to learn from each other, and to use specific words to request their needs. But when emotions are intense and safety is at risk, I get close fast.
If I can stay near by, I will protect, redirect, “sportscast” their feelings and actions. Sometimes I can just start playing or reading a book. When I can’t stay close by, or it is obvious a little needs some recharging alone time, I move them immediately with the rule reminder and give them books to look at or something sensory to squeeze.
So basically, my challenge to you is next time you want to put your littles in timeout… take a few breaths, remind yourself this isn’t personal and calmly say, “I’m going to keep you safe.” Teach them calming strategies, help them listen, and feel safe to succeed. And when you do lose it and yell, (oh my, I still do!), model the apologies and ask for forgiveness!
Click here for the document with these boundary setting phrases and the mindset mantras!
When setting boundaries:
I won’t let you _____, (and stop them/block them/move them gently)
I have to keep ___ (friend(s)/toys/books/etc) safe, I’m taking that now.
It is a rule we don’t _______. If you continue, I will _________. (Give them 10-20 second wait time to comprehend but move immediately if safety is an issue)
I have to put you in this safe spot til I am done _____ and we can calm down together.
One other way to avoid power struggles is when giving directions: Tell them once, then help. No questions, no counting, no bribes necessary and it will be done faster.
Put your shoes on. “I see your shoes aren’t on, I will help now.” (The independent ones MOVE fast!)
Let me reiterate a common theme… Caring for littles is NOT easy as a parent or provider. Every job has stressors, and going from a stressful job (including a SAHM or WAHM job!) to an evening with tired littles is just as hard! But it helps me to keep a mindset remembering their preschool emotions and toddler communication with shouts and aggressive behavior is not abnormal. And it most definitely isn’t personal- it’s developmental.
I am always extra prepared mentally for Mondays in the childcare world, but needed these mantras yesterday as a tired Mom on Sunday! I am printing off a few of my favorites to keep front and center!
First, if I’m seeing frustration, I check myself… I check them! Do we need food? Connection time? Sunshine? Sleep? Boundaries?
And then I “chant” one of my favorite mantras from an online RIE group repeatedly:
Gentle with myself, gentle with my little ones.
His emotions are not my emotions.
It is his job to explore his world and my job to keep him safe.
Be clear, calm, consistent and kind.
It’s hard to be little.
Soften, then connect.
Do less, observe more.
He’s doing the best he can.
Set limits calmly and peacefully.
Don’t react…respond.
Model grace and loving kindness to teach grace and loving kindness.
My words will become his inner voice.
He only gets one childhood.
Trust, Respect, Accept (Acknowledge works too!), Protect.. TRAP them in your love and arms when you are both ready.
And when they need boundaries… it is my opinion in these early years they need to feel safe and loved still… not threatened and shamed… My next blog: “Take a Time-Out Challenge from Time Outs”. I’ll share what I do (and say) instead. (Because yes… it often looks like a “time-out” but it’s all in how we approach it!)
As mentioned in my
philosophy, I believe littles can be resilient and flexible with communication, but they thrive with predictable routine and consistency. (Plus, I thrive and my husband and I have less disagreements when we know the routine and when we schedule in and share some housework!) Except the dishes… the kitchen is MINE! It is an area I can’t release control in and my systems work in only my head!
And before I answer more of my “
Search Questions” in detail, I thought I would show you all the “when” and “how much” we are outside, do “curriculum”, watch tv, at childcare.
But before I share my “intentional” schedules, I ask you to think about if you have one? Even if yours isn’t on paper, do you think your top three priorities are getting the time they deserve? Do you scramble from event to event and feel overbooked? Do you know when you will relax, recharge, have your me time? Do you know when you will vacuum, who is doing bedtime and when you can meal prep, plan, shop and cook? If you think you don’t have time to make an intentional schedule, then you need one the most
We follow a schedule at our careers so why don’t more of us with our family life?!? Even if your career is the ever important SAHM (which is equally as hard as having 7 littles in childcare, if not harder in some ways…), do you have an intentional schedule? Just think about making one… save and copy mine and make one for you and your family. Yes, we all have responsibilities we can’t skip out on so put those in. Even start with just this week recording what you did each day. Look at it in a week and think about what went well, what didn’t. Find the stressful times and patterns, find the “time sucks”, find the quality time. Figure out if you are putting your self-care and your priorities first in the day (the best way to not have them get put aside!!)
Lastly, I have the words “intentional” in quotes, because it is just an estimated plan. Never have we followed our family week 100% perfect…. never has a childcare workday been 100% perfect. Definitely never has my cleaning and nap to-do happened exactly in the order. But having a plan, while being flexible in the plan, has helped me to remain focused, has helped my littles at childcare and my sons in home life know what is coming next. Being
80/20 feels like a win… but sometimes 50/50 is enough for sanity. It has helped us as a family to evaluate if we want to say “Yes” to something more, or if saying “Yes” will make us stressed then we can say “No” to keep life simpleish.
To view our “intentional” family, childcare and cleaning calendars ,
click here. My top three priorities are highlighted on our family schedule (Self care, family time & shared housework). Note, there are three tabs at the bottom of the sheets document. Note, our childcare toy room is only this clean once a week too!
If you make one, I would love to see it and hear how it helps! These
Google drive sheets is a format that works for us with young littles, but I would love to see others!
We had our costume day/Halloween party yesterday!
They all tried some cinnamon-sugar pumpkin seeds from pumpkin we cleaned out! We also had fun with a practice trick or treating around our Nature Park benches! They rang the pretend doorbell, said “Trick or Treat!” and their “thanks you” after I gave them a part of their snack, and we headed off to the next “house”!
My littles enjoyed their Jack-O-Lantern grilled cheeses too!
This month was also a Human Body theme with this last week being “Self-Care”. We always talk about eating a rainbow but when you go to the pumpkin patch, you have to eat lots of orange food!!! I had intentions to draw Jack-O-Lantern faces on the “cuties”, but sometimes something (or lots of things) have to give!
I am excited for some upcoming posts I have in the works and they’ll be here soon now that my time is freeing up after finishing documentation paper work for Parent Aware ratings!
First off, sorry-not-sorry my pictures may be blurry and low quality… I snap a million fast while staring at littles and not what’s on my phone screen. There are million of beautiful food pics on the web if you want to look at those. I’m here to give meal ideas and challenge you to give your children things over and over again, model and eat it yourself, and they will try them! But I don’t make a big deal about it. I encourage a test taste and affirm how brave they are, but if their taste buds don’t like it this time, I trust and maybe next time!
I deconstruct a lot of meals to give practice in fine motors making own sandwiches, stirring up fried rice, etc. Plus, it gives autonomy in choices with what they eat. I put tuna, chicken, sloppy joes, fish sticks, etc. in a cheap romaine lettuce leaf. They decide to make a sandwich or “taco boat” or scoop it out and eat bread separate and protein separate.
But for real, romaine lettuce boats are going to be a weekly or 2 times weekly occurrence. At first only one brave child ate them… than two, now 4! A shout out to the mixed vegetables… I have one little who picks out the corn, one the green beans, one the peas, two just the carrots, one nothing and one everything. I love watching them eat! More on meal time routines and menu ideas later! Subscribe above or check in on Food Fridays
that today… and tomorrow.. and the next day… there will be crying, laughter, shouting, giggles, screeching, hugs, and probably a few (or a lot) of me saying, “I need to keep him safe. I won’t let you push/hit/take his toy again.”
Yes, I focus and share the beautiful moments on Instagram, but being little is messy, stressful and emotional work.
And I believe deep in my core it is important they are allowed to be all these things safely and with confident, calm-as-possible role modeling while they’re little to handle the big emotions when they are big!
So I name feelings, validate feelings, let them have their feelings while protecting as much as possible those around as they begin to learn to use words first, ask for help, recognize emotions and move their bodies to keep themselves safe, etc.
Though this is and will be a daily theme forever, last month it was our full month’s theme! I have a future post with why I won’t buy a curriculum or write detailed lesson plans, but here are a few fun things we did over the month if you want to have a Feelings/Rainbow theme!
Book of the Month:
Song of the Month: If You’re Happy and you know it….
We traced our human bodies and paint dotted where in our bodies we felt that emotions with the matching color from I Am A Rainbow!
We cut out magazines of peoples and studied their faces for their emotions.
We made melon pieces into smiles, frowns, and serious faces.
Our outside nature park “ABC Hill” was “Feelings hill”! We stomped, giggled, cried and yelled while going down!
We colored/chalk/painted Rainbows while reviewing feelings.
If I had older littles, I debated watching some of Inside Out… but that movie is deep for 3 year olds… that movie is deep for me! But they liked looking at these books even though I ad-libbed a few of the lines I didn’t care for in them!
Just like our children can be more in control when well rested, nourished and given predictable routines… I can be calm and confident and at my best when I give to myself first. There will be more on recharging and self-care as a mom and provider in an upcoming post!
Skillet Pizza is a favorite and super adaptable to do with different proteins, veggies, sauces, etc! All my littles love them!
Here is when I read a minimum of 4 books a day to my group:
Morning play time, outside, at circle time, at a meal time, before happy nap, and after nap with cuddles or we write books at table time. We have a Book of the Month that goes with our monthly theme too where I try to read that once a day! Plus, I really love to give my cuddles and individual time with littles with books.
I don’t buy a curriculum, (more on that later), but pick a monthly focus theme. I get library books on these topics. I don’t make them even sit for “story-times” (Except mealtimes! Captive audience!) but even if they are playing off to the side, they hear it all. And usually the next time they hear that book, they want to see pictures. Or they pick up the book and read the pictures to themselves immediately after I put it down!
So I bet most of my littles hear or look at 6-10 books. Or they rip out pages, but hey, at least they were looking at them, right? Take and rip one apart yourself for an outside story book walk!
I have books everywhere and I rotate them. My protected library and Usborne special ones are on Ikea spice racks, mantels and behind gates, but the bathrooms, table time, and toy rooms have books, I’ve accepted wear and tear…and destruction. I also let my littles bring one book to happy nap with them to wind down with.
When else do you try to read during the day? Where else do you have books?
The old middle school I taught at had an “odd to parents” weighted grading scale. It was always important the 5th grade teachers explained it well to the kids and their parents entering our middle school. Families were pros by 8th grade and many even disliked and voiced their disapproval that the whole high school didn’t do the same thing.
Essential their grade in each class was based only 20 or 30% of their practice work, homework, participation. Their formative time when they were learning new knowledge, and making mistakes was a lower percent. “Busy work”, or organizational skills for missing some homework did not weigh heavy on their overall grade. When it came to final copy, project, tests and assessing what they did know by test time, it was 80% or 70% of their grade. Their summative knowledge of a topic and best effort put in on projects and tests did weigh heavier.
As a glimpse of My Story shared, I had let myself be wrapped up in anxiety and worry to do “PARENTING” perfect. I really don’t believe I suffered from postpartum but too much anxiety and worry led my control-freak self astray. It affected me to the core. And in turn, stressed out myself, my marriage and even our children because I believe they feel what we project.
Thinking about applying this “grading scale” to myself as trying my best a majority of time helps me forgive myself when there are moments I’m learning at each new stage in this serious business of caring for littles. And times I fail or just don’t have the energy to try my best on one more “assignment”, I can forgive myself. If 20, 30 or even 49% of the time in the practice and busy moments of life we don’t exactly follow what “the studies say”, NEWSFLASH: your kids will be JUST FINE! Give some quality time and try our best the majority of time. And the rest forgive yourself when you fail, or yell, or put on movies for a mental health break, or go to McDonald’s 3 nights in a row, and move on. Move on to the next hour, tomorrow or the next week!
How well do you forgive your practice and learning time as a parent or provider?
***If you are like some science based research, don’t spend hours, weeks, months reading like I did. Here is a good article summarizing 8 studies. I don’t share that link to cause anxiety or worry in you. Just if you are curious like me and want to try some new things to make care giving to children intentional and simple(ish). Or don’t read it but subscribe to this blog because many of these insights are things I will be posting about in small, digestible bites.. (Did you catch that DQ Marzano followers?)
But you can choose what you serve and when you serve it! Again, a theme of mine, control what I can control… Meal times is when I run the tightest ship because eating is serious to energize our bodies for play and fun! And nutrition is a big deal for me. I strive for 80/20 in the real clean food… fresh fruits and vegetables, 100% wheat, etc.. but I do not let myself get anxious if there are 6 ingredients in a few convenient and favorite snack items but I try to buy the cleanest version.
As I shared in my personal childcare search, I wanted there to be variety in all their meals. I didn’t want cereal 5 days a week for my boys and only the staple foods all the kids love for lunch. Here is a link to my intentional meal plans for your taking pleasure! I love have different meal plans when I get stuck in a rut so have it if you want it! Many of the meals allow for variety and adding different vegetables or fruits.
You can make a variety of the meals over and over again, and they really do start to try new things! And I can’t give up the messiest meals because they all LOVE them the best… so bring on the spaghetti, fried rice/quinoa, soups, yogurt!
I only have time to keep my posts short but if you have more time, this is a favorite article about meal times (The 3rd line in this article has 3 of my TRAP focus words!) Subscribe on this blog for “Food Fridays” when I will share more pictures and recipes of food. There will also be more on meal time routines, limits, intentionally scheduling meal times, fun baking activities, and shopping tips!
I often see friends on social media posting and inquiring if anyone knows of childcare openings or recommendations. Personally, I knew I wanted a home setting when I was looking, but those reasons are for another day.
Infants spots are in the highest demand due to regulations of how many in-home providers can have. Plus many in-home providers choose to take just one because of strict rules and limitations we have in infant care. I jest only slightly here… you tell your significant other, and then you start looking for childcare! I get calls almost weekly for infant or infant/sibling spot because their current childcare can’t take a new infant.
But in my search of calling 40+ and only finding a few that maybe could take both my boys, I know the struggle is real! Plus finding someone you trust makes it even more difficult! In some deeper phone conversations where they had room and a few I toured just a couple after reading their policies and having phone conversations where I asked these questions below. Beyond basic business policies these questions were important to me to find out if we’d be a good fit for one another. I wasn’t looking for perfection and knew I would be compromising in some areas, but my next posts will be about why I asked each question and how I answer them in my home childcare:
- What did you serve for breakfast the last three days?
- If a 2-year-old is taking toys and hitting another toddler, what would you do?
- How do you give your infants/younger toddlers safe spaces?
- Where and when do you go outside?
- What television do you watch, how much and when?
- Do you follow a curriculum or what do your academics look like?
- What are you hobbies or what do you do to recharge and relax?
These may not be your list, but be intentional about what are important concerns to you. You will have to make some compromises, but to have two-way respectful parent and provider communication, make sure you’re ok with the answers to the big areas. You will see lots of my answers to these questions in upcoming posts. I’ll also share the questions I ask potential families in interviews now too.
Parents, what other questions have you asked while finding care? Providers, what thoughtful questions have you been asked while giving a tour or phone interview?
As stated in My Story, I do not have a college degree in “Early Childhood”. Everything I share is my own beliefs and feelings from hands-on experiences, reading books and surfing blogs. But in my undergrad for teaching we had to blab through a LONG paper on our teaching philosophy… But for everyone’s valuable time, and many of my first blog series will be about intentional, simple communication, here are 5 bullet points that surround my parenting and child care T.R.A.P. philosophy on littles!
- Exploring their people and their world is our littles number one job. My job is to let them, trust them, while protecting them along the way.
- Infants, toddlers and preschoolers are great communicators and listeners. My job is to use intentional, respectful communication and project confidence, calm leadership.
- They are whole people who are capable of so much in their time. My job is to accept where they are at and not unnecessarily rush them.
- These early years are the most valuable in the foundation of emotional, social, and moral development. My job is to model respectful responses.
- Though littles are flexible and resilient to change, especially when change is communicated, they thrive with predictable routines and consistent limits. My job is to give them intentional routines and thoughtful, guiding limits.
I love words, and words have SO.MUCH.POWER. Trust me, I debated long and hard about referring to all the levels in my care as “littles” because I truly do not like to label children as anything. Plus, there are huge differences in each age level. But it is a collective term I like to use for all three levels to remind myself they all are still little people for us to be gentle and sensitive towards. It reminds me they have “little” impulse control and “little” brain prefrontal cortex formed. I used to say it about 5th graders all the time… “They are not adults yet”… but it is especially true with our littles… They are not adults OR big kids yet. Let’s help them be big kids and adults we want to be around!
What other “philosophical” cornerstones do you believe about littles? Do you disagree with any of mine? Do you have a different word or term suggestion for babies to five year olds?
Caregiving to littles is definitely NOT simple…But can it be simpleish?
Do you love what you do every moment? Do you love parenting or being a provider every waking second? Or do you feel TRAPPED more than you think you should admit?
Many upcoming posts on this website will share how Trust, Respect, Accepting and Protecting is a new TRAP that helped make parenting and providing easier to me. It helps make being around my boys a lot less about controlling them, but genuinely enjoying them.
We don’t have to fall into a trap of just surviving the days of no sleep, tantrums, and putting ourselves, our marriage and social life totally last.
We don’t have to fall into the trap that we have to sacrifice ourselves during these years.
We don’t have to threaten, bride, punish per minute of their age their testing behavior.
We don’t have to let the fear driven media and consumerism drive our decisions and purchases.
Here are some upcoming topics I will write about this fall and winter if you are curious about specific, SHORT, applicable ways to fall into this new T.R.A.P. Bookmark this site, subscribe or keep following on Facebook if anything below catches your eyes.
Trust:
Why I use as few baby “props” as possible
Potty “Training”
Why I let them play with sticks and climb up slides
Respect:
Why I don’t call them “Time-outs” and what I do instead
Why I ask “May I pick you up?/give you hug?”…even to a 3 month old!
Why I have them “listen to their bodies.”
Accept:
Phrases and “parrot lines” I say ALL.DAY.LONG about emotions
Phrases I try not to say and why
Cleaning up
Why I don’t do planned art
Protect:
Limits and Rules I have and how I “guide” impulsivity and toddler behavior
How I separate infants, toddlers and preschoolers when I need to cook!
Routines and an intentional schedule for childcare and for family life
Why I don’t make 3 year olds sit for circle time and story time.
Other topics I will be touching on including questions for providers to ask in interviews, questions for parents to ask while finding providers, unique relationships between parents and caregiver, home childcare vs. centers, and snippets in their play and exploration that makes everyday so unique and fun.
I will also share monthly “curriculum” themes and some fun meal ideas!
Can caregiving and parenting be easier than we make it? Maybe… maybe not… but I want to try to help. And I want you to help me. I want to grow daily and I’m not afraid of changing my viewpoints, limits, ideas.
