Thursday, August 5, 2010

pretend play.

Recently Cassidy has been really into pretend play. She goes shopping at the farmer's market, cooks in her little kitchen, eats lunch or dinner with her stuffed animals & dolls and even clears the table & washes dishes! While she plays pretend, it's interesting to see how she interacts with "others," figures things out & creates a world for herself - which largely resembles our day to day life. A lot of times we hear phrases & commentary that she doesn't use in real life.

It's definitely neat to watch her develop into a little person. She clearly has her own opinions & agenda most days, but is getting better & better about using her words & more complete phrases or sentences. We got the book "Calm Down Time" recently which seems to have helped her begin to deal with not so pleasant feelings. She loves reading & it's made an impact on her that she feels the same way as the children in the story. The book is part of the The Free Spirit Toddler Tools Series & we have a number of the other books too - I'd recommend them to anyone with a toddler!

This year Cassidy starts preschool. She'll attend the preschool at our church two days a week for two hours. The class is a co-op where there is a teacher & a parent in the classroom each day. The school follows a loose curriculum that is based more on child-lead exploration than academic rigor at this age - which I think is just right! Michael will be on the preschool board of directors this year & assisting with buildings & grounds. I'm not sure how ready I am to have a school age child yet, but don't think I really have a choice!

2 comments:

Sherri said...

I LOVE when they start to pretend!! So cute to watch, and they are really learning life skills while they play, trying things out and practicing. The preschools that my two went to were the same format...co-op, always a few parents there with the teacher helping, and really no academics beyond some art projects. We loved it!

lumpsonablog said...

We're looking forward to it. She's so social that I'm sure it will be good for her. Glad to hear a positive reaction to co-op classes too!