Fun and Play Tips
Brain building can happen anytime and anywhere, including during Mealtime. Mealtime is a perfect opportunity to engage children in simple brain building activities like discovering textures, practicing fine motor skills, and creating memories. Our partners at Vroom have dozens of tips and ideas to help you make mealtime more fun and playful.
Egg Allergy Awareness
Food Allergy Awareness Week (May 10–16) is a great time to review how your program keeps children safe from food allergies. One of the most common allergies in young children is eggs. In this Mealtime Memo, our partners at ICN crack open the basics of egg allergy safety.
Mental Health Resources
Our partners at Sesame Street in Communities have expanded their suite of emotional well-being resources designed to help young children and the caring adults in their lives navigate everyday challenges and build resilience and social problem-solving skills. The new videos and digital content offer practical tools that meet families where they are and support communication between parents and providers.
Culinary Math
Whether you’re making a snack for six children or lunch for sixty, good culinary math skills are essential and make cooking easier, more accurate, and less stressful. This Mealtime Memo from our partners at ICN explains how to convert recipes and adjust ingredient amounts to keep your food consistent and accurate every time.
Outdoor Learning
Our partners at Sesame Street in Communities is dedicated to supporting children’s growth through everyday experiences and have launched new outdoor learning resources to help nurture children’s curiosity and early development. The new resources include three videos, two articles, three printable pages, and a web-based adult learning app to help early childcare providers plan and play outside activities
Boost Your Program with Social Media
Social media is a simple and low-cost way to share the great things happening in your program. You can post about healthy meals, celebrate staff and children, or show your involvement in the CACFP. This Mealtime Memo from our partners at ICN provides creative ideas to engage with families while promoting the high-quality work your program does every day.
Ready, Set, Vroom
Our partners at Vroom have created tips for New and Expecting Parents to help them have brain building moments for their selves and their babies during this time of great change.
Sesame Street Free Print Books & Resources
Our partners at Sesame Street in Communities want to assist in your support of families and caregivers by sharing free print resources to help children continue to play, learn, and find comfort.
Stories Through Time: Read Aloud Challenge
How often do you read aloud to the children in your care? Reading aloud to young children, particularly in an engaging manner, promotes emerging literacy and language development and supports the relationship between child and parent/caregiver.
Power Up with Protein
Protein is a key part of a healthy diet. It helps children grow strong by building muscles, repairing tissues, supporting the immune system, and giving the body energy. Our partners at the Institute of Child Nutrition define protein, highlight its importance, and provide common food sources.