Center Time

My sweet aunt Judy read my post about wanting to start doing centers with Cayman. I had thought of a couple of things he might would be interested in doing. But for some reason, I just kind of hit a wall and couldn't remember the things I did as a two year old teacher at my beloved daycare center in Wake Forest, Ruby Reid Child Development Center (I LOVED that place...)

So Aunt Judy and my mom worked together to come up with some ideas I could do with Cayman for center time. We don't do it everyday. Sometimes we do it together. Sometimes he does it alone while I'm working on supper or something. So far he has thoroughly enjoyed having some new and different activities. (Since we're traveling, we don't have a ton of toys to "rotate" like some of my friends do with their kids' toys. But I need to figure something out because I can tell that Cayman has gotten a little bored with what we do have. Needless to say I'm thankful for something new for him.)

I will continue to post pictures of everything she came up with for him. So far, these are the three activities he has enjoyed the most.

• Felt shapes: A large piece of felt is the background for MANY shapes of varying colors and sizes. Cayman likes to make "pies" (=piles) with the shapes, he likes making cars and houses, and he just likes placing them all over the large background. He can point out triangles, circles, and we're working on squares and rectangles.

• Stringing Straws: Aunt Judy cut colorful straws (straight ones, I'm assuming, not the bendy straws) into one to two inch pieces. She put them all in a snack size baggie and then added a shoe lace. Cayman sat in the airport for a while on our trip and strung straw pieces. Right now he's just getting used to stringing objects. But in the future it will be great for introducing patterns.
• Picture puzzles: Aunt Judy found a pack of three decks of cards at the dollar store. One deck is picture puzzles, another is number puzzles and the third is alphabet cards. Cayman has used the picture puzzle cards so far, and it's definitely overwhelming for him to have access to the entire deck. So we pulled out a few of the pictures (each picture is made up of three cards), scattered them on the table, and then he matched them. He loves that they're all vehicles of some sort. It can be a little challenging though because there are pictures on both sides of the cards. So if a card gets flipped over, it can be a little tough. 

This will be a good time for Cayman and I to get used to learning time together. Ian and I have decided to homeschool our children for some time (we're undecided as to how long). So I want to start introducing learning time with Cayman so we can both get used to it. 

Thank you so much, Aunt Judy, for putting so much thought, time, and effort into this project! It was really very thoughtful of you, and I am so touched by your sweet, generous heart. I know other mommy friends will enjoy using some of these ideas as well!