Circle/Quiet Time: Concepts to share with your child or class this week include family, mom, mother, and what mother’s do. Discuss what a mother is. There are also different types of mother’s adoptive mothers, step mothers, and grandmother’s to name a few, as well as those “mother figures” in our child’s life, such as the aunt or best friend of mom or the lady next door who helps out with the whole neighborhood. During circle time is the perfect opportunity to include the songs, books and finger plays below.
Snack: Family Pizza Night (great for lunch time at school or the children can make together with dad for dinner). You can purchase pre made pizza dough, such as Boboli, or you can purchase the frozen pizza dough in the frozen food section of many grocery stores and roll it out. Another alternative is to purchase English muffins for individual pizzas. Grownups chop the vegetables, but let the children cut what they can safely and according to age. Spread pizza sauce on dough, drops toppings such as pepperoni, cheese, onions, green peppers, mushrooms or spinach. Let the kids really have fun with dropping the food on the dough. I like to top heavily with cheese after the other toppings. Bake in preheated oven about 10 minutes for Boboli or English Muffin Crusts. Really want to be healthy? Use the now available multigrain muffins. For dinner toss a salad and mom will be thrilled.
Gross Motor:
Push the stroller: many times children see mother’s pushing strollers in the mall, neighborhood or park. Take your child or class for a walk on the playground or park and have them push their own “strollers.” This can be play baby strollers such as those created by Disney or Little Tykes or you can even use the little red wagon. For extra imagination load your stroller or wagon with babies, either dolls or stuffed animals when you go for your walk.
Exercise: Sometimes we see our mom’s exercising. What are some exercises you’re your mom does (for classroom). Exercise with your class or child and talk about keeping healthy and why you exercise. A great resource to use is any one of the videos you currently use for exercise just tone it down and do the ones your children can do, just do simple exercises without any resource or try the Sesame Street DVD Elmocize or Food, Water and Exercise.
Step climbing: Mom’s climb up and down steps a lot, getting children up from the bedroom, taking them downstairs, up again for naptime, getting that favorite toy left in the room. Use your exercise stepper, or create your own one step with bricks and board and take turns stepping up and down. Supervise carefully to keep children safe. This also helps with coordination and balance.
Art/Fine Motor:
Every day it is important to include free art and scribble activities for children to learn prewriting skills as well as creativity. For information on building these skills read Building Prewriting Skills through Drawing or Precutting Cut’s Out Learning, Common Preschool Mistake .
Family Collage: If you are in a classroom ask parents to bring in pictures of the whole family and create a family collage. If you are doing artwork at home with your children go through the family album with them, they will love looking at all the pictures and listening to you tell them about each photo and memory.
You can keep it simple with photographs and gluing, but to really get creative and have some fun include scrapbook paper and some fun embellishments like the word MOM on a sticker, which the child can place on every picture of their mother. Other easy embellishments can be cut out frames or a poem about mom’s printed from the computer, one good resource for mother’s day poems is DLTK.com.
Flower Pot: Tried and true, but kids just love getting their hands dirty. Pick up inexpensive flower pots at the craft store. On a tight budget, use pretty larger size Dixie cups. Fill with soil and help kid’s plant seed. If using the flower pots decorate with stickers, paint, ribbons or large buttons (too big to swallow).
Handprint/Footprint Art: There are several different handprint and footprint creations you can make for mom and grandma, here are my favorites.
T-Shirt/Sweatshirt: Purchase a shirt at Hobby Lobby and waterproof paints. For added details purchase puffy or glitter paints. The puffy paint with fine point edge is great for printing words, like, “I love my mom so much I can’t keep my hands off her.” Paint the child’s hand and help them press different colored hand prints all over the shirt.
Wall Poster: Get any color poster board you want and then paint the child’s hands and feet with brightly colored or glittery paint. Help them place hand and footprints on the poster board. Print out these Mother’s Day poems on good card stock paper:
Footprint Poem
The pitter patter of little feet
Leave behind something dear and sweet
A precious treasure for me to keep
The memories of your little feet.
Handprints Poem
This is my hand.
My hand will do
A 1000 loving things with you
And you will remember
When I am tall…
That once my hand
Was just this small.
Glue poems onto poster board. Let everything dry and frame in poster board frames available from Wal-Mart.
(Great for Grandmothers too!)
Mom’s Placemat: Mom gets her own specially designed placemat, great for serving Mother’s Day Breakfast or Dinner. Cut out pictures from magazines of different activities of moms and children together, mom’s walking, planting, playing, chasing, whatever. Allow the children to choose the pictures they like and glue them down onto the card stock. For just a small charge each of them can be taken to a Kinko’s or teacher supply store and be laminated, but if you have a tight budget, wait until nap time and cover them yourself with clear contact paper.
Variation: Queen for a Day Placemat: Write, stamp or glue letters for Queen for a Day onto 8 ½ x 11 card stock, cut out and glue queenly items like a crown, mantle or scepter.
Music/Fine Motor
The Barney Song is a must for Mother’s Day preparation. Dad’s maybe you can sing along with the children in a performance on Mother’s Day morning.
I love you (point to eyes, cross hands over heart and point to other person)
You love me (point to other person, hands over heart then point to yourself)
We’re a happy family (draw BIG smile on your face)
With a great big hug (hug each other or yourself)
And a kiss from me to you (blow kisses or kiss your own children)
Won’t you say you love me too (great time for rolling on floor giving great big hugs.
I love you so much!
A Wiggle (kids wiggle around)
A Jiggle (now jiggle around)
I Love You So Much (hug yourself then arms wide open)
I just have to Giggle (clutch tummy and giggle and laugh loudly)
Bonus Activities: Toddlers love to help. This is the perfect week to teach them about all the things they can do to help mom as well as teach them valuable skills such as responsibility, sharing, helping and caring for others. Some great ideas for your children to help you with are sorting laundry, folding clothes, making beds (or cots if daycare), cleaning up from meals (this works in the daycare too. Place a plastic bucket on the table and have the children place their dirty dishes from lunch in there). Dusting, emptying the dishwasher and using the Swiffer sweeper are favorites in my home. Be sure not to allow children any direct contact with cleaning supplies.
Letter of the Week: M
Colors of the Week: White, Red, Brown and Black (Mom’s come in all colors)
Note: Any of the plans can easily be adapted to grandmother or other special women in your life, just replace mom or mother with grandmother or Queen for a Day is also great for those other important mother figures in your child’s life you want to acknowledge.
Books:
Three great adoptive mother books ranging in price from $6.99-$9.99
Even Firefighters Hug their Moms by Christine Koel MacLean ($3.99)
My Mom (Talk about Board Book by Debbie Bailey and Sue Huszar ($6.95)
If Mom Had Three Arms by Karen Kaufman Orloff and Pete Whitehead ($11.99)
Cost of plans:
Pizza ingredients: 2.99/dough, $2.99 pepperoni, $2.48 cheese (serves lots of people)
Poster board .79/sheet
Embellishments: vary from .25 each to 1.99 each depending on what you purchase
T Shirt $4.99
Sweatshirt $9.99
Variety of paints if you don’t have them $3.99 package of paints assorted colors
Mother’s Day is one of the best opportunities to teach children to appreciate others and all they do, as well as to express genuine affection for others. Have a Wonderful Mother’s Day with your children.
