MAY
In the Garden, Yoga, I Can Help Care for the World Around Me, Musicians
Global Gull: Potty, Diaper, Water
May’s curriculum brings amazement! Over the next four weeks, our Nest Play Curriculum will support our youngest learners as they use sounds and gestures to express their needs, begin recognizing how their bodies feel when they need rest while practicing self‑soothing and safe sleep habits, and strengthen connections with familiar faces and voices. These nurturing moments also build early memory and recognition skills as children respond to people and routines they know. Throughout the month, children will explore cause‑and‑effect during play, discovering what happens when they try something new and experiencing the joy that comes with success.
Our Hummingbirds are learning to use sounds and gestures to express their needs and ideas. Activities like Peek‑A‑Boo and Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes help strengthen early communication and speech skills. With the Peek‑A‑Boo Book, children are encouraged to vocalize familiar words like “peek” and “boo,” while also using gestures to show adults they want to play or interact. Songs such as Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes support children in matching words to body parts, helping them communicate how they are feeling through movement and gestures with their caregiving adults.
Through daily routines, safe sleeping practices, and selected activities like “Rest Time Round Up” and “When I Go to Sleep” our Hummingbirds will begin to connect how their body feels, recognizing when they are ready for sleep.
Hearing the voices of loved adults and familiar people helps infants feel safe, secure, and connected to their teachers. This sense of comfort deepens as children recognize familiar faces in activities like Familiar Faces and engage with their caregivers during experiences such as Nursery Rhyme Sing Along and Read with Me, Teacher. These strong, trusting connections create the foundation for learning, supporting infants’ emotional security, curiosity, and overall development.
Early memory and recall are developing quickly in Hummingbirds as children begin to recognize familiar items, stories, and songs. During activities like My Classroom, teachers talk with children about their environment to support recognition and understanding. Multi‑sensory experiences such as Touch It, Feel It, Grassy Me, and 5 Senses in Nature engage touch, taste, sound, sight, and smell, helping strengthen memory through exploration.
Exploring cause and effect is an exciting part of learning for Hummingbirds. Through repeated experiences like Paintbrush Exploration and Shake It, children begin to predict what will happen, solve simple problems, and feel proud of their successes. Teachers will also share familiar stories connected to our theme, In the Garden!, helping build confidence, strengthen memory, and foster a growing love of language and books.
For this unit in Global Gull, our Hummingbirds will learn the A.S.L. words for ‘potty,’ ‘diaper,’ and ‘water.’ Teachers will use these core signs in day-to-day interactions and conversations with our infants to further bring awareness to this new form of communication. Teachers will offer hand-over-hand guidance to our older Hummingbirds that are beginning to mimic the signs themselves!
In our Paints and Pianos program, our Hummingbirds will experience a range of feelings as they listen to well-known musicians: The Beatles, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, and Ray Charles. They will move, shake shakers, and wave scarves as their bodies and brains connect during these magical musical moments. Through these artists, children will hear beautiful harmonies, fun nonsense words of Scatting, the pure emotion of the Blues, and the stories told as these songs unfold. Our Education Coordinators will provide language describing the sounds of instruments and the feelings they evoke as infants become familiar with musical legends.
In Fit Buddies, our Hummingbirds will experience different yoga, and meditation poses to help them develop a sense of self, strengthen their core, and feel connected to their environment and teachers. Education Coordinators will create a calming atmosphere with meditation music as they interact individually with each child and assist them in a developmentally appropriate yoga pose.
In The Art of Living, children learn how to care for the world around them. Exploring our garden beds, clearing old vegetation, and preparing spaces for new plants helps children begin to understand the passage of time and the importance of caring for living things. By watching for items that do not belong outdoors and could affect plants or wildlife, children take early steps toward environmental stewardship. Through teacher modeling and shared experiences, children learn, “I can help care for the world around me,” building independence and pride both in the classroom and beyond.