Four Hugs a Day

 

 

In February of 1999, I told my 16-year old son that I was going out for the night.  As I answered his question about where I was going, “To see Charlotte Diamond”, he started to laugh and recount his early childhood memories of us singing Charlotte’s songs together.

 

Recently I had a similar experience as I closed a seminar with university students with Charlotte’s song “May There Always Be Sunshine”.  Students spontaneously blurted out, “I remember that song!  I used to sing that with my mom!”  They began to sing and sign this wonderful song.

 

It really doesn’t seem that long ago that my son belted out “Sasquatch”.  It is not just the words and lively rhythms that I recall; it is the feeling of holding my son, sharing, laughing and playing together that I remember.  What is it about Charlotte Diamond’s songs that touch everyone’s hearts?  Her songs have the capacity to teach about building relationships and to bring us together within our family, community and world.  How can a song have this power?  As I listened to my son, I thought about how our singing made me feel – calm and connected to my child then and now years later.

 

Listen to, and don’t forget to sing, “Four Hugs a Day”.  It really is about teaching how to communicate with your child.

 

Step one – look them right in the eye.

Step two – nose to nose.

Step three – reach your arms.

Step four – you can’t do any harm with . . .

Four hugs a day – that’s the minimum.

Four hugs a day – not the maximum.

 

I read the words of Charlotte’s songs, and I see that she is giving me the same information as famous child psychologists.  Every child needs to feel – I am loved; I am loving; I am capable; I belong.  Charlotte emphasizes the importance of being accepted, loved and the feeling of belonging.  She helps our children learn to become caring and competent.  She accomplishes all of this using a fun and adventuresome style. 

 

Her songs are full of imaginary adventures, animals, weird and wonderful words, and lots of actions.  If you have an active child, these songs are made for her.  She teaches us about moving our body.  Jumping, crawling, and stretching are part of some of Charlotte’s songs.

 

She also teaches us new languages.  Many songs are translated into French and Spanish.  A few other songs are translated into Cantonese, Hebrew, German, Russian, Norwegian, and Italian.  Most songs include the use of sign language.  Even very young children love to use the signs as we sing the words.

 

Charlotte is a certified teacher with degrees in Zoology and French.  This is reflected in the themes of nature throughout her songs.  What do each of us need to grow?  Charlotte’s song “Each of Us is a Flower” recognizes that all people need friends, family, food and nurturing.  What a wonderful way to learn about our unique qualities.  We are becoming more aware of the beautiful diversity in our world.  Throughout her songs we learn about love and respect of ourselves, others, and nature.  We sing about celebrating differences and leaving the world a little bit better.

 

Join us on Wednesday, April 22 as we present Charlotte Diamond in concert at the Forest City Community Church.  Her use of props, catchy rhythms, and interactive style makes for an entertaining event for everyone.  For tickets or more information, please contact Jane Powers at 519-434-3644 x36.

 

By Marg Glendon, Parent Educator

Family Literacy Day

Family Literacy Day is Tuesday, January 27, and it’s not too late to make plans!

Whether you are putting together plans for your Family Literacy Day celebration, or you are looking for ideas on how to encourage family literacy everyday, ABC CANADA Literacy Foundation has resources for you.

Join us at Childreach on January 27 as we discover literacy in play and learn activities all day.   From 6 to 7 p.m., our Early Years Literacy Specialists will provide special literacy activities for the family.

Ice/Snow Castles

 

·           Pour water into different size plastic containers (e.g. cottage cheese, small yogurt, large ice cream buckets.)

·           Add food colouring to water using different colours in each container.

·           Freeze in freezer.

·           On a nice sunny (not ‘biting’ cold) winter’s day, bring containers out of freezer and sit containers in water long enough to loosen ‘coloured ice’.

·           Let children take containers of coloured ice outside to make snow castles or other creations. This will keep the children fascinated with the coloured ice and white snow!

·           Children can also play indoors with this activity.  Put snow in a square plastic tub with the coloured ice.

Reduce, Reuse, & Recycle – and Save Money!

 

 

As our lives focus more and more on our battered environment, we face the challenges and opportunity to teach our children the four R’s – Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Recover.  One of the ways to achieve this is in using recyclable materials for children’s crafts projects.  This offers a great many advantages, not the least of which is saving money, as well as demonstrating to the children the conservation of resources and the challenge of reusing everyday materials.

 

Challenge your own creative thinking, as well as your children’s, in discovering unique crafts from the following “junk” boxes, coffee and juice cans, egg cartons, fabric, wood scraps, margarine lids, Styrofoam trays, and packing chips . . . the list is endless.

 

Boxes

·        Art Frames – Use the tops of tissue boxes to frame small pieces of art.  Collect the tops from a variety of gift boxes.  Cut out the centre so that the opening is slightly smaller than the art to be displayed.

·        Cereal Box Puzzles – Cut the front of a large cereal box into pieces (the number and complexity of the pieces will depend on the age and ability of your children).  Store the pieces in a large envelope with an identical cereal box front pasted on it.

 

Cards and Catalogues

·        Pack your Suitcase – Use a 9” x 12” piece of construction paper (better still, recycle computer paper) for each suitcase.  Have the children paste on pictures of clothing, shoes, etc.  Fold in half and add paper handles.

·        Salt Cards – Choose holiday cards with winter scenes.  Paint the snowy area with glue and then sprinkle it with salt.  When the glue is dry, the salt will look sparkly.

·        Junk Mail – Save old envelopes, junk mail and magazine stamps for dramatic play about mail carriers and the post office.

 

Egg Cartons

·        Paint Sets – Put leftover tempera paint into the cups of styrofoam egg cartons.  Let the paint dry thoroughly, then the children can use the cartons like watercolour paint sets.

 

Margarine Lids

·        Mobiles – Use a large plastic lid as the base for a mobile.  Punch a hole near the top to hang the mobile, and punch three or four holes around the lower edge from which to hang mobile items.

 

Milk Cartons

·        Traffic Lights – For each traffic light, cover a quart milk carton completely with black paper.  Cut out red, yellow and green circles and have children pasted them in the appropriate places.  Add string to the top so that the children can hang them outside and play ‘traffic games’ with their tricycles.

 

Styrofoam Chips

·        Pussy Willows – The children draw dranches with cotton swabs dipped in black paint, then they paste on pieces of chips to represent pussy willow blossoms.

 

Supermarket Fliers

·        Fishing Game – Make a fishing pole from a dowel or a long paper towel tube.  Tie a magnet to one end of a string, and tape the other end of the string to the pole.  Paste food pictures on heavy paper pieces and put a paper clip on each piece.  The children can fish for food pictures.  You can also ask them to fish for a particular colour of food or for a food in a particular food group.

·        Lotto Game – Obtain several copies of the same flyer.  Make individual game boards from heavy paper.  Divide each one into six sections.  Paste a picture of a food item in each section.  Make a corresponding single game piece for each picture on the game board.  Have the children match the playing pieces to the food pictures on the game boards.  Cover the game boards and the pieces with clear contact paper for durability.

Let’s Make Toys – Spoon Puppets

 

Materials:

Wooden, plastic or metal spoons

Fabric

Pipe cleaners

Paper

Felt

Yarn scraps

Paint

Markers

Glue

 

Paint, glue or draw basic features such as mouth, eyes, and hair onto spoon.  Add a hat if you wish.

 

Make simple clothes from a circle of fabric with a hole cut in the middle for the spoon to slip through.

 

Add arms made from pipe cleaners or paper.

 

Make a puppet or a family of puppets for story telling!

Sidewalk Chalk

 

½ cup Plaster of Paris

¼ cup water (for coloured chalk, add food colouring to water)

 

·        In a small container (margarine tub) put Plaster of Paris.

·        Add water – DO NOT MIX YET!

·        With masking tape, cover up one end of a toilet paper roll.

·        Stir mixture into a soupy consistency.

·        With a spatula, put half of the mixture into the toilet roll.

·        Tap down the toilet roll to release air bubbles.

·        Pour the rest of the mixture into the toilet roll.

·        Tap down again to release the rest of the bubbles.

·        Let stand for 24 hours.

·        Tear off the toilet roll and enjoy!

Make a Time Capsule

 

What you need: a tin or metal box with a lid that seals; paper; pens; materials you collect (see below for ideas).

 

 

1.      Decide when you will open your time capsule—in 1 year? in 10 years? In 20 years?

2.      Gather Materials that will be interesting in the future.

3.      Put everything in the capsule, seal it, and label it with the words “Do not open until (date you have chosen).”

4.      Here are ideas for things to place inside your time capsule:

·        Photographs

·        Newspaper clippings

·        Menus from your favorite restaurants

·        A list of today’s prices for things such as gas, milk, and a movie

·        The names of top film stars and actors

·        The name of the Prime Minister

·        Hit songs and popular bands

·        Pages from a current fashion magazine

·        The names of the teams that won popular sports events such as the Super Bowl or the World Series

·        Predictions for the future

·        Secret notes to other members of the family, not to be read until the capsule is opened