Alison Gopnik: What do babies think?

We stumbled across a great discussion from Alison Gopnik about how babies think.  Alison Gopnik is a professor of psychology and affiliate professor of philosophy at the University of California, Berkley.

Such a great presentation that every parent should see. Check it out!

Special thanks to TED for allowing our blog to share and get great discussion and thought going!

Music for Kids Summer Line-up

This is too good to pass up and who doesn't love free music! 

The Music Division and Austin Public Library have partnered to host Music for Kids. Music for Kids is a six-week summer concert series featuring local, live musical performances suited for kids and teen youth at library locations throughout Austin.

Performances are free and appropriate for the whole family. All are welcome and invited to attend.

Music for Kids Summer Line-up

Date	Musician	Time	Location
6/24/13	Lucas Miller	4 pm	Howson Branch
6/27/13	Neal Kassanoff	2 pm	Pleasant Hill Branch
6/28/13	Lucas Miller	2 pm	Terrazas Branch
6/28/13	Neal Kassanoff	2 pm	Faulk Central Branch
7/2/13	Lucas Miller	2 pm	Cepeda Branch
7/3/13	Gina Chavez	2 pm	Ruiz Branch
7/8/13	Gina Chavez	2 pm	Spicewood Springs Branch
7/9/13	Gina Chavez	4 pm	Twin Oaks Branch
7/10/13	Neal Kassanoff	2 pm	Windsor Park Branch
7/11/13	Neal Kassanoff	2 pm	Carver Branch
7/15/13	Neal Kassanoff	4 pm	Old Quarry Branch
7/16/13	Gina Chavez	2 pm	Southeast Austin Branch
7/17/13	Gina Chavez	2 pm	Little Walnut Branch
7/18/13	Neal Kassanoff	2 pm	University Hills Branch
7/24/13	Lucas Miller	2 pm	Hampton Branch at Oak Hill
7/24/13	Neal Kassanoff	4 pm	Manchaca Road Branch
7/25/13	Lucas Miller	4 pm	Milwood Branch

Who's Ready for Kindergarten?

   Pre-kindergarten graduation is bittersweet at The Children's Center of Austin. It's amazing to watch our children grow by leaps and bounds. It can be difficult for us to let go our of children as they embark on their new journey to kindergarten. We know that when our alumni students arrive to kindergarten, they are confident and ready!

The expectations of kindergarten go beyond being able to recognize the alphabet and numbers. Here's what our community kindergarten teachers want.

• An ability to listen. Can your child sit for a story or activity for a period of time? Something as simple as sitting down and listening to a captivating story promotes rich language, develops attention skills, and will help build your child's concentration. It's important to read to your child and ask questions about the storyline. Active listening is important to a child's learning process. 

• Socially and emotionally apt. Children need to learn and work together in a group setting. Even at kindergarten age, children can sometimes still be territorial about toys and friends. Children need to be given the opportunity to practice their problem solving and negotiating skills with other children in the way of taking turns, using their words to convey their feelings about people and situations. If you find that it's difficult to for your child to initiate problem solving, encourage them to convey their concerns about the situation and allow processing time for your child to come up with ways to resolve the situation. 

• Strong fine motor skills. Children need strong fine motor skills in order to cut, paste, and even hold a pencil. A way to strengthen the small muscles in your child's palm and fingers is by crafting. One of our favorite activities is stringing cereal on to string or pipe cleaners. Sorting beads by color is another fun solution for building fine motor development. 

• Self independence is key. Children need to learn how to button their coats, tie their own shoes, go to the bathroom and wash their hands, open and unwrap their lunch items. 

• Letter and number recognition. Children entering kindergarten should be able to distinguish upper and lower case letters. Children should also recognize and be able to show the value of numbers. 

If you are in the area and would like an visit a pre-kindergarten classroom, please call us at 512-266-6130. We would love to meet you and your child. 

Ways to Get Preschoolers to Stop and Listen

Ever feel and sound like a broken record when you are trying to communicate with your preschooler?We do too sometimes. Getting a child to stop and listen can be hard, especially if your child is engrossed with an activity and it's time to move on to something else. Here are some tips on how to help your preschooler stop and listen.

1. Walk over to your child. It's just much more easier than shouting across a room and more effective just to walk over to your child or a group of children. Position yourself at eye level with your child and communicate with he/she in a friendly and positive manner. Children have a tendency to tune out others around them.

2. Eye contact is key! It's really important that children try to make eye contact with you. Children will look around and sometime avoid making eye contact. When this does happen, we remind the child and say, "When you look at me, your eyes tell me that you are listening to me" or "I need to see your eyes" also works too. Please remember to be communicate in a friendly and positive manner.

3. Your message should be short, sweet, and to the point. Children are not fans of listening or being lectured for extended periods of time. Convey your message quickly and effectively.

4. Practice makes perfect! You may have a child who refuses to look at you or even not want to listen to your words. You may want to lead your child to another quiet area away from other children and adults. Children (and adults) don't enjoy being called out or redirected in front of a group. Treat and communicate in a manner in which you want to be treated or communicated with.

Kid Friendly SXSW Events

SXSW isn't just for adults. SXSW also offers events for children and their families and we love that!  Here are some really great kid friendly activities for children and their families to enjoy. 

1. The Austin School of Rock's SXSW Showcase, Wednesday March 13, 2013 at Scholz Garten-1607 San Jacinto beginning at 1:00-6:00 p.m. The Austin School of Rock is presenting this day party where their student bands will play. All ages are invited and there is no cover charge (although donations are appreciated). There are a few parking garages around Scholtz’s Garden that are a short walk.

2. SXSW at Auditorium Shores, Wednesday, March 13, 2013, 1:30 p.m-dark. Great music, food, and drinks. 

3. A walk down South Congress-Wednesday, March 13, 2013, 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.  A stroll down South Congress will prove to be entertaining. Enjoy a meal, shop, and listen to a variety of bands who are eager to entertain you as they play live on South Congress (between Annie St. and Riverside)

4. KUT-Live Music at The Four Seasons-Wednesday, March 13th through Friday, March 16th, beginning at 7:00 a.m.  This year's line up includes Jimmy Cliff, Ruthie Foster and Ray Wylie Hubbard. There is a $10 charge for each adult and $5 for parking at the hotel, but the $10 is a fund raiser for the Seton Shivers Cancer Center AND it gets you live music, breakfast tacos and coffee. 

How Does Your Infant Learn?

We love our infant program! Our infant team is incredibly dedicated and highly knowledgeable about infant and toddler development. An infant's first form of communication is by crying. When an infant cries, he/she is only communicating their needs and interests. Parents and caregivers are the infant's first teacher and it is vital that we do our best to provide opportunities for our infants to explore what's around him/her.  So how do we give opportunities to our infants so that they can explore? Our curriculum coordinator, Nicole Chisolm recommends spending lots of "face time" with your infant. Talk to your infant as you would to an older child or adult. By talking to your infant, you are promoting language.  Be sure to point out objects and people to your infant within your environment as this will help your infant to associate the object with the name.

Infants love to put objects in their mouth. This is commonly known as mouthing. Mouthing helps your infant to feed a need to better know the world around them. By mouthing, infants are able to determine textures, shapes, sounds, and tastes.

By providing your infant opportunities to see, hear, taste, and touch, you are helping your infant to build his/her motor development as well as social and emotional development.

Sensory Play Ideas for Toddlers

We are always looking for ways to encourage sensory play for our toddlers.  Our toddler teachers, Ms. Sue and Ms. Beth incorporated our toddlers' love and curiosity of animals into sensory play. These sensory bags are very clever and super simple to make for your toddler.


Here is what you are going to need:

• Your toddler's favorite tempera paint color! 
• Animals. The CCOA teachers used animal shaped erasers. You could also use small pictures of animals too!
• Ziploc bags
• Clear packing tape

The teachers poured in just enough paint to coat the Ziploc bag and tossed a few animals in.  They sealed the bag and taped the bag down on to the table.  The children loved touching and squishing the bags. Ms. Sue and Ms. Beth encouraged the children to find and identify the animals.  The children had so much fun with the sensory bags. What I loved most about this activity was that there was no mess to clean up.

Ms. Sue used a light blue hair gel and placed a few penguin erasers in the bag. The sensory bag resembled water and ice. Ms. Sue explained to the children that penguins live in a cold and icy environment and that it looked similar to the sensory bag. 

Homemade Bubble Bath

Bubble Bath Recipes

Children's bubble bath can be expensive and sometimes have ingredients that we are unsure of or just plain don't want on our baby's skin. Here are some recipes for natural bubble baths that are not too expensive to make. Check the list of ingredients used for allergies first!

Cherry Berry Bubble Bath
By Pioneer Thinking
Ingredients:

1/2 cup unscented shampoo
3/4 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt (regular table salt is fine)
15 drops cherry fragrance oil
Directions: Pour shampoo into a bowl and add water.
Stir gently until well mixed. Add salt, and stir until mixture thickens.
Add cherry fragrance and place in decorative bottle.

Lilac Bubble Bath
By Valerie Gladstone

Ingredients:

1 quart (4 cups) distilled water
1 cup unscented shampoo
4 ounces liquid glycerin (skin moisturizer)
5 drops lilac fragrant oil
2 ounces coconut oil
Directions: Mix together and store in a container.
Pour a tablespoon or more in running water for your bath.

Raspberry/Vanilla Bubble Bath
By timethief

Ingredients:

8 oz. unscented liquid soap
2 oz. distilled water
8 drops vanilla fragrance oil
6 drops raspberry fragrance oil
Directions: Mix all and pour into a container.
Pour a tablespoon or more in running water for your bath.

Love Potion Bubble Bath
By Abigail Beal
This bubble bath will put you in a romantic mood.
All of the ingredients are considered aphrodisiacs
– so look out! ;)

Ingredients:

6 drops jasmine oil
3 drops rose oil
3 drops vanilla oil
6 drops ylang ylang oil
1 quart of distilled water
1 bar of castille soap (4 oz. bar melted in microwave)
4 ounces liquid glycerin
Directions: Mix the water, soap and glycerin together and stir. Now add your essential oils to the mixture.



Ingredients

• Castille soap is used to soften and moisturize the skin, its made from 100% Olive Oil.  Liquid glycerin, a by-product of soap making, is another skin moisturizer. Also note that if you can’t find unscented shampoo, you can use a mild baby shampoo in its place.
• Coconut oil has a nutty and floral fragrance and almond oil is virtually unscented. Adding a half cup of either one to your bubble bath will soften your skin.
• Essential oils are stored in special cells, ducts, or glandular hairs that are distributed among the roots, leaves, bark, stems, and flowers of the plant. Some sort of an essential fragrance oil is one of the main ingredients in a homemade bubble bath.
• Some essential oils are relaxing and soothing. They include lavender, sandalwood, marjoram, frankincense, myrrh, rosewood and chamomile. They will help relaxing you and help you drop off to sleep. Other essential oils uplift and energize. They include peppermint, spearmint, eucalyptus and lemon oil. Some essential oils have therapeutic effects. For example, eucalyptus oil will break up congestion if you have a cold.

Strawberry Shortcake in a Jar

Strawberry Shortcake in a Jar

Keep your picnic treats away from the ants! This cute jar recipe travels well and looks adorable...can also be made gluten free with gluten free cake mix.

Strawberry Shortcake in a Jar

• 1 boxed Yellow Cake Mix, baked according to package directions
• 1 can vanilla frosting
• 1 (8 ounce) whipped topping
• 1 quart fresh strawberries mixed with 1/4 cup sugar

Crumble the yellow cake mix into large chunks. Press a small amount of the crumbled cake mix into the bottom of four small canning jars.  In a small bowl, mix together the frosting and whipped topping. Spoon a small amount on top of the cake layer. Spoon a few strawberries on top of the frosting layer, add another layer of cake, frosting, and strawberries.

Top each jar with a lid and ring. Store in the fridge up to 12 hours before serving.

Smoothie Recipes for Kids

Smoothies for Kids

We all know kiddos need those fruits and vegetables but sometimes convincing them that they do is an entirely different story.

Smoothies are a super way to get more veggies in your kids' diets simply because the sweetness of the fruit masks the taste of the veggies! Here are a few delicious and nutritious recipes to try at home!

Berry-Cado Smoothie
vegan, makes 2 servings

1 1/4 cups orange juice
1/2 avocado
3/4 cup frozen blueberries
1/2 cup frozen raspberries (or strawberries)
1 kiwi, peeled
1/2 – 1 banana, frozen pref’d
1/2 cup ice

garnish: avocado slice

Blend. Pour. Sip. Smile.

Easy Energy Almond Shake
vegan, serves 2

2 cups almond milk or soymilk, vanilla flavor or cow's milk
2 large frozen bananas, ripe
2 Tbsp almond butter
1/2 cup ice
1/4 tsp cinnamon
garnish: roasted almonds

Directions:

1. Place all ingredients in a high power blender. Blend on high until smooth and thick.

2. Pour into glasses and garnish with roasted almonds.

Green Smoothies

1 cup plain or vanilla almond milk (go with vanilla if you have more of a sweet tooth) or cow's milk
1-2 handfuls fresh spinach leaves
1/2 ripe frozen banana (if your banana is not frozen, add 2-3 ice cubes)
tiny bit of honey or agave, optional
1-2 tablespoons ground flaxmeal, optional

Combine ingredients in blender and blend for 1 minute.

Serve in a fun glass and enjoy.

Sunflower Playhouse

Sunflower Play House for Spring!

Spring is right around the corner and here is a neat project for backyard play that lasts all summer long! A sunflower playhouse can be an awesome, eco-friendly addition to any backyard!

Sunflower Playhouse:  

You will need:

Tall sunflowers seeds (the taller the better-read the package)

Morning Glory seeds (the taller the better)

Black plastic or mulching fabric (optional)

Mark out an area for your playhouse, square or rectangle

Plant a sunflower and morning glory seed together.  Leave an opening for a door.  Keep well watered.  Weed around your plants being careful to not pull up the new plants.  If you have some seeds that don’t come up, you can just put more seeds in that place.

As the plants grow the morning glories will climb up the sunflowers.  When they are reaching near the tops of the sunflowers, run a string back and forth from one side to the other and from corner to corner.  The morning glories will continue to grow along the strings and form a roof.

If you want a grassy floor in your playhouse you can choose an area on the lawn.  You will need to lay down strips of black plastic or fabric mulch around the perimeter of your playhouse so the grass doesn't over take the baby sunflower and morning glory plants.  Secure the plastic or mulch to the ground.  Plant directly into the plastic or mulch by cutting holes in it and plant your seeds in the dirt.

When everything is blooming and your playhouse is complete, you can put a small table and chairs in the playhouse for summer tea parties!

Handwashing for Healthy Kids!

Easiest Way to Stay Healthy This Winter!

With the worst flu season in ten years upon us, and cold and viruses around every corner, it seems like there is a new product on the market every few days that guarantees to keep you cold and flu free this season.

But, the easiest and simplest way to stay healthy is already, literally, in the palm of your hands.

Handwashing is the simplest and quickest way to rid your little one's bodies of all the germs they pick up at the playground, grocery store, preschool...the list goes on and on. And there actually is a process to proper handwashing that can be learned by even the smallest toddler. Adults counting to twenty while little guys scrub is also a quick learning moment too!

Homemade Crayons

Kids out of school and bored? Here is a recipe for fun on a chilly winter's day from Martha Stewart!

Get your kiddos to rip the paper off the crayons- it'll keep the little hands busy a tad longer...Heat makes a crayon a little loopy; it may melt into a swirl or pool into a whirl. With this in mind, we chopped up crayons and baked them in shaped mini cake tins, making large blocks that are easy for toddlers to hold and will surely inspire older artists. Encourage kids to come up with combinations: A blue-and-white blend for drawing the sky, for example, and a mix of reds and oranges for sunsets.

Tools and Materials
Kitchen knife
Old crayons
Mini-cake tins (we used pans with heart- and circle-shaped pockets)

Crayon How-To
1. Parents can use the knife to chop crayons into pea-size pieces, taking care to keep colors separate so kids can combine them as they like.

2. Preheat the oven to 150 degrees while children fill the tin with crayon pieces, arranging them in interesting designs.

3. Bake just until the waxes have melted, 15 to 20 minutes.

4. Remove the shapes after they have cooled. If they stick, place tray in the freezer for an hour, and the crayons will pop out.