Gingerbread House Daycare
3350 E. 54th Street V5S 1Z3 Vancouver, BC, Canada

How Was Your Day? Questions to ask your kid instead of "How was your day?" When you pick your kids up from school, is your first question, "How was your day?" Here's the thing about this question, it's uninspiring and will likely yield an indifferent answer. So how can we engage better with our kids that will yield more of a conversation and engage those cerebral cells! ... So here's a list compiled by Sara Goldstein that is guaranteed to be met with more than an indifferently delivered, "fine." Have fun with them! Questions a kid will answer at the end of a long school day: What did you eat for lunch? Did you catch anyone picking their nose? What games did you play at recess? What was the funniest thing that happened today? Did anyone do anything super nice for you? What was the nicest thing you did for someone else? Who made you smile today? Which one of your teachers would survive a zombie apocalypse? Why? What new fact did you learn today? Who brought the best food in their lunch today? What was it? What challenged you today? If school were a ride at the fair, which ride would it be? Why? What would you rate your day on a scale of 1 to 10? Why? If one of your classmates could be the teacher for the day who would you want it to be? Why? If you had the chance to be the teacher tomorrow, what would you teach the class? Did anyone push your buttons today? Who do you want to make friends with but haven’t yet? Why not? What is your teacher’s most important rule? What is the most popular thing to do at recess? Does your teacher remind you of anyone else you know? How? Tell me something you learned about a friend today. If aliens came to school and beamed up 3 kids, who do you wish they would take? Why? What is one thing you did today that was helpful? When did you feel most proud of yourself today? What rule was the hardest to follow today? What is one thing you hope to learn before the school year is over? Which person in your class is your exact opposite? Which area of your school is the most fun? Which playground skill do you plan to master this year? Does anyone in your class have a hard time following the rules? http://day-care-vancouver.com/blog/2017/8/4/how-was-your-day #daycarevancouver #gingerbreadhousedaycare

Kids Need Water Not Fruit Juice Fruit juice may taste great to your child, but it's loaded with sugars that can contribute to adverse health conditions like obesity, tooth decay, and overall poor nutrition. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recent recommendations state that fruit juice should not be given to infants under 12 months of age because it offers no nutritional benefit to them. Water and breast milk should be the preferred drink. ... After 12 months of age, the AAP sates that infants can be given limited amounts of juice each day but advices that for all age groups: Fruit juice offers no nutritional benefits over whole fruits. Whole fruits and vegetables have nutrients and fiber while fruit juice is loaded with quick processing sugars (this includes fruit juices that have no sugar added). Children should not be given fruit juice at bedtime or as a treatment or management for diarrhea. For children ages one through 6 years of age it's still recommended to limit fruit juice to no more than 4 ounces per day. Read the label and make sure it is 100% fruit juice, a lot of juices are loaded with sugar and have very little 'real' juice if any. It should also be pasteurized for safety and don't give juice in a sippy cup or bottle, this is very important for preventing cavities. These are guidelines and with any guideline, there may be exceptions (if your child is on an iron supplement, for example, your doctor may want you to give it with orange juice). If you have questions about this recommendation, or anything else about what your child should eat or drink, talk to your pediatrician. Here is the American Academy of Pediatrics policy statement on fruit juice: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/conte/139/6/e20170967 http://day-care-vancouver.com//kids-need-water-not-fruit-j

Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Meeting children's social emotional learning (SEL) needs in preschool can enable them to thrive mentally, physically, and academically in kindergarten and well beyond into adulthood. Developing social-emotional skills during preschool includes being able to get along and cooperate with others, manage strong feelings, focus attention, and persist at challenging tasks.... Social emotional skills developed during the preschool years are important because they are critical for long-term school and life success. Early development of these skills is reached to have a number of positive adult outcomes, including: good physical and mental health, interpersonal relationships, education, employment, and more. In conclusion, preschool SEL programming has the potential to reduce the school readiness gap and help children become healthy, thriving adults. #daycarevancouver #gingerbreadhousedaycare http://day-care-vancouver.com//social-and-emotional-learni

Attributes of Bravery Make time to watch "The Gutsy Girl" author Caroline Paul's talk on raising brave girls and boys. Get inspired by the power of adventure and productive risk-taking, no matter your age or gender! Parents: she provides references and resources for further learning on microbavery and resilience. The fear we learn and the caution stays with us into adulthood -- hesitation in speaking out and our lack of confidence in our own decisions. So how do we raise brav...e kids? Here are Caroline's key points on how kids become brave: Bravery is learned and like anything learned, it needs to be practiced. Take a deep breath and encourage your kids to skateboard, climb trees etc - studies show that risky play teaches hazard assessment, delayed gratification, resilience and confidence. When kids get outside and practice bravery, they learn invaluable life lessons. Try and not over caution our kids, because then you're telling them that they shouldn't keep pushing themselves, that they're not good enough, that they shouldn't be brave. Moms and dads (especially moms) have to start practicing bravery too. We can't teach our kids unless we practice it ourselves. So practice... at home, in the office, in our relationships. Guide your kids to access their bravery, maybe the hill is too steep, but let her be guided by courage not fear to determine what's possible and what isn't. This is not about the steep hill in front of her, but about her life ahead of her. Watch the Ted presentation here: http://www.ted.com//caroline_paul_to_raise_brave_girls_enc #daycarevancouver #gingerbreadhousedaycare http://day-care-vancouver.com///3/16/attributes-of-bravery

Parents, How Much Do You Know About Antibiotics? There's an effort by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to help make sure that we use antibiotics wisely. In the U.S. 1 in 5 of children visits to health care practitioners result in a prescription of antibiotics. This amounts to over 50 million prescriptions annually! Of which 10 million are for respiratory illnesses that antibiotics aren't helpful for. Antibiotics are of course very important and life savin...Continue reading