Circle Time

I purchased a circle time calandar about a year ago with the intention of using it with the kids. At the time, however, they were just too little to sit still and enjoy and understand what I was doing. So for the past year it's been sitting idle in Little Bean's closet. Recently I pulled it out and hung it up. It's been a huge hit! Each day we spend about 15 to 20 minutes doing circle time. We talk about the month, day and the season. We check the weather and plot it with stickers. We are counting down to Miss O's birthday (only 4 days left!) and up to 100 using a self made hundred's board and a dry-erase pen. We also work on telling time. Little Bean can tel time by the hour and by the half hour, Miss O is only learning to recognize the numbers 1 through 12 on the clock. I also checked out a book from the library that has circle time activities in it, and the past several weeks we have been doing a garden theme to go along with out circle time. Each day the book gives us a little "science" lesson about some animal or plant from the garden, a song or chant, and a corresponding craft. We just finished up our garden theme, and will be moving on to either ponds or zoos next (also from this book). If you want a good circle time book, that is open and go, with easy, manageable crafts, I highly recommend the one we've been using. It's called Sing! Play! Create! by Lisa Boston.