“Here is an “Oh so true” Top Ten list of perks of being a child care program Director as published in Child Care Exchange.

Perks of Being a Director
December 29, 2011

10.  Having beautiful, young children in your life Monday through Friday, but your evenings and weekends are free.

9.  The first to know the current children’s fever/cold/flu symptoms.

8.  Your ECE administrative abilities include junior plumbing skills — i.e. you’ve never met a toilet you couldn’t unclog.

7.  Having at your ready a repertoire that includes over 100 children’s stories, songs, and finger plays.

6.  Experience in setting-up and hosting staff ‘wedding,’ ‘baby,’ and ‘good-bye’ parties.

5.  When insomnia strikes, you alone can recite pages of state licensing regs until you nod off from sheer boredom.

4.  If you live near your work, you’ll know the future generations of school cheerleaders, newspaper deliverers, Girl Scout cookie sellers, drug store and fast-food cashiers, etc.

3.  After retirement, at the nursing home, you will know over 300 craft projects to make from empty toilet tissue rolls.

2.  Knowing you are helping to get the next generation off to a great start.

1.  Unlimited snacks and hugs.

More kid recipes…

Cupcakes
by Rusty (age 6)

“You put em in the oven and then you cook em and get em out. You put about 4 scoops of sugar in em. And then you cut em up and put about 3 gallons of milk and how about 5 scoops of chocolate and nothing else.”

Pasgetti (Spaghetti)
by Rachel (age 4)

“First of all you put water in the pot and you put about 4 pieces of pasgetti in it. Then you let it cook for about 10 hours. And then we eat it. “

Get the Recognition You Deserve As a Child Care Teacher

Every year the Terri Lynne Lokoff Child Care Foundation recognizes 50 exceptional child care teachers for their critical role in providing quality early care and education. Child care teachers from all 50 states are invited to apply. Each teacher selected receives $1,000, $500 for the teacher’s personal use and $500 for a project they design to enhance their classroom experience.

For more information go to www.tllccf.org

Recipe for Radishes by Amanda (age 4)

Since this is the harvest season, thought I’d share one of my favorite kid recipes.
 
Recipe for Radishes by Amanda (age 4)
 
First you plant them in your garden. First you put the seed in your garden. Then you water it. Then, in a couple of weeks some of your mushrooms will grow and your radishes and your carrots and your peppers and your tomatoes and your yellow green peppers. And then, after you take all the vegetables in your garden, you make soup. You have to put all of your vegetables in a pot, then some milk, then some soup. Then you stir it up and you have a big pot of soup. (But babies can’t eat it cause they’re too little.)
 

Susan Vessels

United Way campaign

4-C just finished our internal United Way campaign and we did it again! 100% of our employees gave to United Way. Thanks to all the 4-C staff for their generosity again this year. It’s a great way to make a difference in our communities.

Ready or Not

A recent study by Applied Survey Research links poor 3^rd grade math and language test scores to high absenteeism in kindergarten and 1^st grade. The findings suggest that frequent absenteeism (more than 6/year) may erase a child’s readiness for school.   Read the article…

Parenting on the Go

Check out the free Parenting Ages and Stages App for Smart Phones. It is by the folks at Parenting magazine and it is very cool. You can download your child’s age and receive messages that are customized to your child’s age and stage of development. It has great topics like how to tell if your kid is gifted and how to tell if your baby is left or right handed before they are born! Topics cover issues from pre-natal to the school years.  I particularly liked the “5 Big-Kid Discipline Dilemmas –Solved”.

Vote for Kids

” I hear from more people about dog food than I do about child care.”
That was a statement made by one of our former governors to illustrate that child care advocates and parents need to speak up if they want to change child care.
 
What a sad statement. And I’m sure it’s true. Parents of young children have their hands full with work and family. Child care providers are exhausted and trying to hold their businesses together so have little time to contact legislators.
 
But here is your chance. Take a half hour next Tuesday and VOTE for kids. Vote for your kids, my kids, your neighbor’s kids. Your voice and vote are important.

Education A Two Way Street

I was taken with a comment made during a reception we had for our Spanish speaking child care providers the other night. Edouardo, a very eloquent gentleman who used to be a professor in Cuba, was talking about helping his wife with the children in their family child care home.

He said that although he hopes the children learn from him during the day, he always learns something from them too. I hadn’t thought about that for a long time but I sure do agree with him. Among other things kids have taught me: not to take life too seriously, a hug goes a long way, you should always be comfortable when reading, friends are really important, the artistic process is more important than the product. Dancing is a good thing.

Why we do the work we do.

Susan Vessels