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SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANS

INFANT

GET MOVING

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET MOVING

ACTIVITY Read or listen to Barnyard Dance! by Sandra Boynton. Play some silly music while holding your little one and act out different ways to dance, including twirling, prancing, promenading and taking a bow.

LEARNING SKILLS Language and Literacy

Materials Book or read-aloud

Get moving

ACTIVITY Practice coordination and movement by walking the tightrope with your little one. Draw a line on a sidewalk with chalk, lay out a piece of rope or string or apply tape to your floor. Then gently and carefully walk the line with your little one; either hold him or her, or for your crawlers and walkers, invite them to engage in this activity.

LEARNING SKILLS Gross Motor Skills

Materials Chalk, string or painter’s tape

Get Moving activities are designed to either engage your child’s full body in a physical activity to start the day with a jump, OR to start the day planning for play, a critical area of development in organizational thinking.

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET MOVING

ACTIVITY Sit on the floor with your little one facing you. Give your child a small toy to hold in his or her hand. Once your child has a good grasp of the toy, give your little one a second toy to hold in the other hand. Once your baby can hold a toy in each hand, offer a third toy. Your little one will try to grasp the third toy with full hands but will soon figure out how to put down one toy to pick up another.

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Toys

ACTIVITY Use colorful scarves and try juggling them for your baby like a circus performer. Your baby will watch in delight of the bright colors moving about. After you juggle, encourage your infant to try tossing the scarves as well. Talk about the colors you see and what your baby is doing.

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Colorful scarves

ACTIVITY Show your baby pictures of different animals you might see at the circus. After looking at pictures, move like the different animals. Stomp like an elephant, using your arm like an elephant’s trunk and letting out a trumpeting sound. Crawl on all fours and roar like a lion.

LEARNING SKILLS Gross Motor Skills

Materials Pictures of circus animals

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SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANS

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GET MESSY

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET MESSY

Get mESSYGet Messy is a section designed for your child to engage in sensory play. Sensory play allows learners to make sense of the world around them by taking in as much information as possible from an experience by using as many intake receptors as possible on their bodies. It allows information to absorb better and with more meaning.

ACTIVITY Using a large container or during bath time, add dolls, child-safe baby shampoo and washcloths or sponges. Show your little one how to bathe the baby. Encourage conversation by asking, “Can you bathe the baby? What do you do with the soap?”

LEARNING SKILLS Creativity and Discovery

Materials Dolls, washcloth or sponge, baby shampoo, bin with water or tub

ACTIVITY Place a few toys or safe objects that float into a small container of water. Encourage your little splasher to reach and grab for the items and place them back in, all while enjoying supervised splash time.

LEARNING SKILLS Creativity and Discovery

Materials Water, container, objects that float

ACTIVITY Place your little one in a highchair and provide various plastic animals and various paint colors. Show your little one how to place the animal in the paint and place it on a large piece of paper or a recycled box.

LEARNING SKILLS Creativity and Discovery

Materials Plastic animals, paint, large piece of paper

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET MESSY

ACTIVITY While looking at a picture of a big-top circus tent, provide red and white finger paint for your little one. Tape a piece of white paper to your child’s highchair tray or the table and provide the paint for exploration. After painting, look at the picture and describe what your child has painted. Infant’s eyes are drawn to high-contrast colors.

LEARNING SKILLS Creativity and Discovery

Materials Paper, picture of big-top circus tent, red and white finger paint

ACTIVITY Make cotton-candy-inspired molding dough using this baby-safe recipe. After making the dough, supervise play with your infant and talk about the colors and textures.

LEARNING SKILLS Creativity and Discovery

Materials Baking soda, water, vegetable oil, flour, salt, food coloring

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SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANS

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GET FOCUSED

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET FOCUSED

ACTIVITY Read or listen to Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell. Take a stuffed animal and a cardboard box or container and hide the animal in various places in relation to the box. Use descriptive language to describe, e.g., “I am placing the elephant in the box.”

LEARNING SKILLS Language and Literacy

Materials Book or read-aloud, stuffed animals, recycled boxes

Get FocusedGet Focused is a time of day devoted to learning a specific skill. It is a time that is best for children to engage independently or with their parent to fully concentrate and build new skills through hands-on lessons.

ACTIVITY Read or listen to Peek-a WHO? by Nina Laden. Encourage your little one to make the different sounds that the animals make in the story. Add soft puppets to illustrate the animals as well. Pretend to make the animal sounds. Say an animal sound, pausing to give your baby time to imitate the sound.

LEARNING SKILLS Language and Literacy

Materials Book or read-aloud, animal puppets or stuffed animals

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET FOCUSED

ACTIVITY Gather a variety of soft toy animals. Call out different body parts and have your child point to his or her body then point to the same part on the toy animal. Point out how body parts look different from one another. For example, show your child that a pig’s nose is a different color and shape from a person’s nose.

LEARNING SKILLS Science and Nature

Materials Stuffed animals

ACTIVITY Make different animal sounds such as oink, neigh, moo, hiss, quack, roar and cheep. Use pictures or stuffed animals to connect the sound to the animal. When children hear and understand differences in sounds, it builds a skill that will be necessary once they start learning letter sounds.

LEARNING SKILLS Science and Nature

Materials Pictures of animals or stuffed animals

ACTIVITY Engage in a carnival or circus game with your little one by stacking paper cups or blocks in a way that you and your little one can successfully knock down on the floor. Older infants will enjoy doing this on their own; younger ones might like to watch you.

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Stacking cups or blocks

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SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANS

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GET OUTSIDE

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET OUTSIDE

ACTIVITY Create some type of shady structure with your little one using an umbrella, blanket or sheets over chairs or whatever else you can find. Practice going “under” and “in and out” of the structure with your baby.

LEARNING SKILLS Music and Movement

Materials Umbrella, blanket or sheet

Get OutsideGet Outside is a time of day designed to do just that—get outside and explore. Exploring offers children new ways to relate to their world and engage in physical activities and inquiry-based learning.

ACTIVITY Experiment with bright, colorful tissue paper or streamers outside. Wave them above your head, twirl them around and, depending on the age of your excited little one, allow him or her to play with the items too.

LEARNING SKILLS Music and Movement

Materials Colorful tissue paper

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET OUTSIDE

ACTIVITY Read or listen to Circus by Lois Ehlert. While outside, provide objects of different shapes, such as a circle, square, triangle and rectangle. The shapes may have different textures and sizes such as a plastic ring from a stacking toy, a smooth wooden block or the metal triangle from a set of rhythm instruments. Use descriptive language to describe the shape, texture and color of the objects as your little one handles them.

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Book or read-aloud, objects of different shapes

ACTIVITY Think about a clown car at the circus. Bring your animals outside, stuffed or plastic, and place them in a toy where they will fit. This can be a wagon, a plastic dump truck or a plastic car. Talk about how many animals will fit and the concepts of “in” and “out.”

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Toy car, truck or wagon, stuffed or plastic animals

ACTIVITY Talk about how every living thing needs water, including grass, flowers and trees. Demonstrate this with a garden hose or watering can. Provide a small container that your older baby may be able to grasp so your little gardener can help water the living things also.

LEARNING SKILLS Science and Nature

Materials Watering can or garden hose, living things to water

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SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANS

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GET RELAXED

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET RELAXED

ACTIVITY Take a stretch break and at the same time let your little yogi engage in some tummy time. For you, try the locust pose, pretending to be on a trapeze reaching for that next swing. Lie on your tummy, lift your chest and shoulders and look up at the sky. Pretend you are a trapeze performer flying from one swing to another. This pose opens the spine and strengthens your core. Tummy time for your baby yogi does the same thing!

LEARNING SKILLS Gross Motor Skills

Materials Website

Get RElaxedGet Relaxed is a time of day to unwind and do something low-key. This allows your child to take a brain-break and rest their bodies so that they can enjoy more active play after they relax or take a rest.

ACTIVITY It is teddy-bear stretch time with your little one. Using one of your child’s stuffed animals such as a teddy bear, mimic some of the stretches you might do alongside your little one with the bear. Then practice some stretching of your choosing on your own.

LEARNING SKILLS Gross Motor Skills

Materials Stuffed animals

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET RELAXED

ACTIVITY Try the giraffe pose. This is wonderful for balance, especially when your baby is just learning to walk.

• Support your baby into a standing position; • Gently stretch his or her hands overhead with

palms meeting each other and hold.

You can also try gently swaying your baby from side to side in that position. Do it for a few seconds and then help your baby relax.

LEARNING SKILLS Gross Motor Skills

Materials N/A

ACTIVITY Try a new relaxing musical series such as the Mozart for Babies lullaby collection as you relax and unwind.

LEARNING SKILLS Music and Movement

Materials Relaxing music, music player

ACTIVITY Try bubble blowing to soft music and dim lights with your little one. The soft music, dim lights and calming bubbles will relax you both.

LEARNING SKILLS Social-Emotional Learning

Materials Bubbles and soft music

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SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANS

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GET CREATIVE

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET CREATIVE

ACTIVITY Fill an empty tissue box or baby-wipes box with scraps of textured material or large pieces of fabric. While your baby is seated on the floor, encourage your little one to pull out the fabric pieces one at a time. Talk to your baby about the shapes, textures and colors of each piece as he or she pulls it out of the box.

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Tissue box or recycled baby-wipes box, textured material or large pieces of fabric

Get CreativeGet Creative is a time of day designed for your child to have open-ended experiences with a variety of mediums. By giving them opportunities to create with no specific outcome in mind it exercises their creative thinking skills allowing them to be better communicators and problem solvers.

ACTIVITY Explore something different with your creative little one and wet cotton balls. Put a small amount of water into a tray or bowl and have fun placing the cotton balls into the water. To encourage your little one, you might have to toss some in the water ahead of time. Have fun squeezing, dripping and feeling the water and the cotton.

Be attentive as babies may want to put the cotton balls in their mouths.

LEARNING SKILLS Science and Nature

Materials Cotton balls, water, tray or bowl

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET CREATIVE

ACTIVITY Sit with your little one on the floor and place a muffin tin and container of objects in front of him or her. Demonstrate first how to pick up an object from the basket or container and place it in the muffin tin. Think out loud as you are modeling, e.g., “I put one animal into the tin. Now I am putting the toy elephant into the tin.”

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Muffin tin, various objects

ACTIVITY It is time for fluffy-bin choice time! Provide a wide variety of soft toys, stuffed animals, puppets and soft dolls in a box or container or surround your little one with them. Which one does your child select first?

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Variety of soft toys

ACTIVITY Young babies are attracted to the contrasting colors black, white and red. On a paper plate, draw a face with black hair, eyebrows, eyes and nose and a red mouth. Tape your masterpiece to a wall. Babies see best when viewing objects seven to nine inches away from their faces.

LEARNING SKILLS Cognitive and Mathematics

Materials Paper plate, red and black markers, tape

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SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANS

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GET CONNECTED

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET CONNECTED

ACTIVITY Read or listen to Five Little Monkeys Sitting in a Tree by Eileen Christelow. The book takes place on a family picnic. Plan your own family picnic on video chat.

LEARNING SKILLS Language and Literacy

Materials Book or read-aloud, video chat device (optional)

Get ConnectedGet Connected is a time of day to connect with family members or loved ones in a variety of ways. Social and emotional connections are imperative to all learning. If a child does not feel secure and connected, they cannot engage appropriately and cannot learn effectively. So, have fun with these ideas for both virtual and personal connections!

ACTIVITY Dance with your loved ones by playing some music together, connecting virtually and dancing away with your tiny dancer.

LEARNING SKILLS Music and Movement

Materials Music, video chat device

ACTIVITY Take photos of some of your little one’s favorite dolls, toys and other cuddly items. Share these favorites with a loved one via your favorite interactive platform.

LEARNING SKILLS Social-Emotional Learning

Materials Video chat device

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SUMMER LEARNING SUMMER LEARNING FUN WEEKLY PLANSINFANT • GET CONNECTED

ACTIVITY A circus clown’s job is to make people laugh. With your baby, call a relative or other loved one and see if you can get him or her to laugh. Try blowing your baby’s hair or playing peek-a-boo to see if you can get your baby to laugh. That laughter will be contagious!

LEARNING SKILLS Social-Emotional Learning

Materials N/A

ACTIVITY With your baby in your lap, sing “Five Little Monkeys” and count the monkeys on your fingers. Use dramatic actions to follow along, e.g., use your hand to make a phone and hold up to your ear, bring your hand to your head lightly to demonstrate bumping your child’s head.

LEARNING SKILLS Music and Movement

Materials Video for reference