Getting Your Sillies Out! (Session leader: Christine)

The January 25th session was a way for our toddlers to "explore" their feelings. Of course, many of our little ones (LOs) are in the throes of the "terrible twos and threes," and their main feelings probably center around "frustration" when they have tantrums! However, our LOs can also be happy, sad, mad, scared, sleepy, and yes...SILLY!

We started out the session with a welcome song, "Hello!" (sung to the tun of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star):

Let's see who is here today, Who has come to join our play?
Everyone sit close at hand,
Say your name, then you can stand,
Let's see who is here today,
Who has come to join our play?

We then looked at the emotions we were going to talk about--being happy, sad, mad, silly, scared, and sleepy--and got the kids moving with a fun song, "If You're Happy and You Know It...," with a bit of a twist:

If you're happy, happy, happy, clap your hands.
If you're happy, happy, happy, clap your hands.
If you're happy, happy, happy, clap  your  hands, clap your hands.
If you're happy, happy, happy, clap your hands.

If you're mad, mad, mad, stomp your feet...(repeat)

If you're sad, sad, sad, say, "Boo-hoo!"...(repeat)

If you're scared, scared, scared, say, "Oh no!"...(repeat)

If you're sleepy, sleepy, sleepy, take a nap...(repeat)

If you're silly, silly, silly, give mom a kiss...(repeat)

Hiding emotion cards around the room, Christine would make happy/sad/mad/silly/scared/sleepy faces at the kids who then had to find the correct card.

We then moved on to "Baby Happy, Baby Sad," a book that talks about a day in the life of one baby who is "happy" and "sad." The kids loved listening to the explanation of why the baby was happy or sad.

This session's craft was creating faces. Blank faces were passed out to the kids who selected and pasted different eyes, noses and mouths to make up silly faces. Some of the pictures were certainly creative!

Towards the end of the session, we read more two books, "I Love You Through and Through" and "The Mommy Book."

The session ended with a goodbye song sung to the tun of Farmer in the Dell):

Now our day is done.
We've had a lot of fun.
It's time to go
So don't be slow
Goodbye to everyone.
Put your things away,
It's time for us to say,
"Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye,"
Until another day.

I hope that the kids learned a few new words to tell you how they're feeling!