Welcoming Our New Friends!

Hello to our new friends - Rebecca, Dhanika, and Anthony! We are more than excited to welcome you to Children & Friends. Each step ahead is part of a wonderful journey, and every turn brings a new learning moment. We love to take our time to get to know one another. Learning each other’s names, sharing the things that interest us, talking about our pets, and discovering so much more together.

To begin, we introduce ourselves by spelling our names and sharing them with one another. This helps everyone feel seen and included while building a sense of belonging right from the start.

​As part of our introductions, several friends proudly share their names: Dhanika introduces herself beautifully. Rebecca says her name with a smile, Anthony shares his name with his own way. Each introduction gives us a glimpse into our personalities and opens the door for new friendships to blossom.

Ryan spells his name with prompts and some confidence.

​Rebecca does the same, smiling as she tells her friends about herself.
​These moments help strengthen connections and encourage us to celebrate our identities.

We continue our journey of getting to know one another by exploring our feelings through a balloon drawing experience. Each one of us is provided a balloon to mark-making or draw how we are feeling in that moment.

This gives everyone a chance to express our emotions in a creative way and to see how each of us experiences feelings differently. Together, our balloons become a beautiful display our unique emotions and a reminder that every feeling has a place in our classroom.

Rebecca says she is feeling happy and colors her balloon with cheerful designs and happy rainbows.

Faces and feelings.... the way we move and position our facial features and our bodies sends strong messages to others!

Exploring the art of interpreting facial expressions and body language to help improve our emotional intelligence and communication skills.

Kalyan expresses his happiness through drawing. He chooses to depict himself playing. A reflection of how play brings him joy. What stands out first is the way he captures emotion in his drawing. He begins with his facial expression, focusing carefully on features that shows he is happy. 

As his drawing progresses, Kalyan demonstrates growing attention to detail and body awareness. When prompted to include more parts of his body, he thoughtfully adds an oval shape for his face and a rectangle for his body. He does not stop there. He extends the image with hands, legs, and even hair, showing increasing confidence in representing the human form. 

Kalyan's drawing journey today not only highlights his emotional literacy and creativity but also reflects his emerging understanding of body parts and proportions. His willingness to build on his work and respond to gentle guidance shows his curiosity and developing skills.

Emily chooses to draw happy people on her balloon, reflecting the importance of relationships and togetherness in her world.

​This learning experience gives us a creative outlet to express emotions that may otherwise be hard to put into words, while also encouraging us to notice how feelings can be different for each person.

Following the tune of Two Little Dickie Birds we incorporate the characters with ourselves and people dear to our hearts. Luka sings with his charming smile and body movement according to the tune and rhythm. 

Emily uses her fingers to act out each part with smiles and gestures. The actions of hiding and reappearing fingers help develop finger dexterity and control. This rhyme introduces concepts of quantity and the idea of taking away and adding back. The "disappearing" fingers help us understand that something can go away and still come back as object permanence.

The song "The More We Get Together" is chosen to learn together as we form friendships through the many ways. It is such a warm, welcoming song! Perfect for us learn about togetherness, friendship, and shared joy through music and movement.

To bring some fun and energy into our day, we sing Old MacDonald Had a Farm. We do not just sing along - we also use instruments to create our own rhythm as we sing together. Some friends shake shakers and a few even sing our favorite animal sounds extra loudly. The combination of voices and instruments create a lively atmosphere where we can engage with the song in our own unique way. Music gives everyone a chance to participate, even those who are still feeling shy about talking in front of the group.

We work with baking soda clay to create handprint keepsakes. Each one press his or her hand into the clay, leaving behind our own unique mark.

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We then decorate the handprints with shells, making each piece a special creation. This learning experience engage our senses—feeling the cool, smooth clay, pressing firmly to see our print appear, and carefully choosing shells to design with. The final products are not just art pieces; they become symbols of belonging and individuality, showing that everyone leaves a mark in our classroom community.

Kindest,
Children & Friends.