The Source for Learning is proud to participate in NAEYC’s Week of the Young Child, celebrating 50 years of early learning with children, families, and educators! 
Wednesday, April 14th
Theme: Work Together
Infants
Carry Me (Babies Everywhere)
By Rena D. Grossman
See all the unique ways babies around the world are carried by hardworking parents going about their day. Babies are carried around the world in unique ways! See babies tucked in a blanket, peeking out of a basket, riding in a backpack, or wrapped in a parent's arms. This is one of the first ways that families work together as they share time!
Carry an infant as you go about the day doing safe work and use self-talk to describe your actions and the work you’re doing. You’ll be exposing them to rich language, and they’ll receive a lot of vestibular and proprioceptive input, which helps develop their overall development!
Toddlers & Twos
One Love
By Cedella Marley
This engaging children's book, adapted from a timeless Bob Marley song and written by his daughter, teaches diversity and working together through song! Toddlers will delight in dancing to the beat and feel joyful seeing the change when one girl enlists her community to help transform her neighborhood for the better.
Share the joy of singing together and point out that we all work together when we share a song. Talk about ways we call can work together to take care of our world. Put trash in the trash can, recycle, and grow plants from seeds. Make every day Earth Day!
Preschool/Pre-K
Boxitects
By Kim Smith
This book ticks so many boxes— literally and figuratively! Use this story to talk about creativity, imagination, teamwork, friendship, and that winning is not what matters. Are you a Boxitect?
Invite children to be boxitects! Ask families to help collect boxes to bring into the classroom. Give children the freedom to stack, glue, tape, and paint boxes to create the most amazing thing they can imagine. Encourage children who wish to work together to discuss a plan as they get started and enjoy how the plan changes as the creation evolves. Help children problem-solve and consult each other as they encounter challenges while building their creations.
Preschool/Pre-K
Be a Maker
By Katey Howes
Follow a little girl throughout the day as she creates things alone at home, with a friend, and in her melting pot community—a wonderful inspiration to use your imagination!
Give children a huge stack of paper or plastic cups and encourage them to work together or alone to play with and create a stack of cups that is as tall as they are. If the preschoolers’ cup tower falls down, help them problem-solve and consult each other to come up with solutions and ideas to stack cups stably in different ways. Discuss with the group what worked best, what didn’t, and why.
All Ages
The Very Busy Spider
By Eric Carle
Read how this spider persists all day building her web despite the variety of farm animals that try to distract her. At the end of her busy day, see how her web is both beautiful and useful!
Ask children to work together and pretend to be spiders as they help you wrap paper streamers around chairs and tables in the classroom to build a beautiful web. After they have made an obstacle course, everyone can pretend to be a fly and try to crawl and step through without getting caught in the web.