Kids Connection Care and Education

Nature Face Exploration

The toddlers at Carnegie CCC explored nature through a creative, open-ended art activity. Children used a variety of colourful flower petals, leaves, and natural materials to create their own unique nature faces on brown paper. They explored different textures, shapes, colours, and patterns while arranging and gluing the natural materials to bring their imaginative faces to life. Each child had the opportunity to make their own creative choices and express their ideas through nature-inspired art.

How Does Learning Happen?
Through this nature-inspired art experience, children explored natural materials using their senses and creativity. They developed a sense of belonging by sharing materials and ideas with others, while strengthening fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, concentration, and confidence through open-ended creative exploration.

Learning Story
Our Surprise Bean Garden!
After cleaning up our sensory bin, which included beans and sand, we left it in the sandbox for the weekend. When we returned, we noticed something exciting...the beans had germinated and started to grow! The children were surprised and happy to discover this unexpected change.
We carefully took the little sprouts from the sandbox and placed them into a pot filled with soil so they could continue to grow. The children showed curiosity as they observed the roots and talked about what plants need to grow, such as soil, water, sunlight, and care.
This experience encouraged the children to become curious scientists and caring gardeners. They were able to make observations, ask questions, make connections, and participate in caring for living things.
HDLH Connections
Belonging:
The children worked together and shared their excitement about the growing beans. They developed a sense of connection to their classroom environment and to the living things they were caring for.
Well-Being:
Caring for the plants provided an opportunity to nurture and take responsibility for another living thing. The children experienced joy and excitement through discovering something new.
Engagement:
The unexpected germination sparked curiosity, investigation, and problem-solving. The children observed changes in the beans and wondered about how and why they had grown.
Expression:
The children expressed their ideas and discoveries through conversation, observation, and hands-on exploration. They used their own words to describe what they noticed and shared their theories about what would happen next.
What We Can Explore Next
We can continue this investigation by observing the plants over time, documenting their growth, watering them, and exploring questions such as: What will happen next? What do plants need to grow? Where do roots come from? What happens when we plant different kinds of seeds?

Transportation Exploration

The toddlers at Carnegie CCC explored a variety of transportation-themed activities through art, sensory play, construction, and imaginative play. Children created colourful car track paintings by rolling toy cars through paint, explored floating boats and water movement in a sensory bin, stacked and connected train tracks to build their own railway, and drove toy cars while pretending to travel to different places. These hands-on experiences encouraged children to explore, create, and share ideas as they played together.

How Does Learning Happen?
Through transportation-themed play, children were actively engaged in exploring different materials and using their imagination during open-ended experiences. They developed a sense of belonging by playing and building together, while strengthening fine motor skills, problem-solving, coordination, and confidence through creative, hands-on learning.

The Troopers at St Monica painted with mud, sticks and leave to created a collaborative mural.They experimented with textures and natural materials. The children expressed their ideas while developing fine motor skills.

Hidden Bug Dig!

A quiet search quickly turned into an exciting adventure as the children eagerly dug through the sensory bin, wondering which rainforest creature they would discover next. With every scoop of beans and every hidden bug uncovered, smiles grew bigger and excitement spread from one friend to another. They proudly filled their jars with their tiny discoveries, sharing their findings and encouraging one another along the way. This playful investigation sparked curiosity, strengthened fine motor skills, and beautifully reflected HDLH’s Engagement as children learned through exploration, discovery, and joyful play.

In the toddler Butterflies Room at Christ the King CCC, our little chefs had so much fun making homemade pizza together!

The children took turns spreading the tomato sauce, sprinkling cheese, and adding their favourite toppings. They carefully used spoons to spread the sauce and watched as their pizza came together. After it was baked, everyone enjoyed tasting the delicious pizza they had helped make.

Cooking together gave our toddlers the opportunity to explore new foods, practice fine motor skills, and experience the joy of creating something from start to finish.

HDLH(Belonging): Children worked together, took turns, and shared materials while preparing the pizza.

At Carnegie CCC - the FDK campers in the STEM elective built houses to protect the little pigs from the Big Bad Wolf!!! They used a variety of materials to build their houses.And then the wolf came and he huffed..... and he puffed.... and he huffed ...and he puffed!!!

Rock Painting Exploration

The toddlers at Carnegie CCC explored painting with rocks using a variety of colours. Children used the rocks to stamp, roll, and create different marks, while some also enjoyed pressing the paint with their hands to explore the texture. This open-ended activity encouraged creativity, sensory exploration, and fine motor development.

How Does Learning Happen?
Well-Being was supported as children explored different painting techniques through hands-on, sensory-rich experiences, building confidence, creativity, and self-expression through art.