Nursery Ministry

[Ericka]

I want to connect with other people in the Nursery Ministry (0 to 3 yrs.)

[Andrea Roach]

I am also just starting to connect with other people in childrens ministry. I am over the 0-5 year olds in our church.

[Tracy L. Meyers]

We are just beginning a 0-2 toddler's Sunday School Class. I would love to hear what others are doing in their Nursery Ministry.

[Sara Keleher]

you found one! We should meet sometime! I am over our infants-5 year olds. There are unique challenges to working with these ages. We have 3 nursery rooms (infants, toddlers, and twos) and two preschool rooms (3s and 4s/5s not yet in Kindergarten). We are growing...not as big as Sheffield, but one of the bigger AG churches in the KC area. I have been looking for local people who work with early childhood kids (not all kids under 6th grade) to network with. Not many churches have someone over the earlychildhood kids...you have to be a certain size for that. Anyhow...I'd love to chat sometime! Be Blessed!
Sara

[Jessica]

Hi :) I am in ministry with Infant through Preschool.

[Mary Lynn Wooters]

I am a full time volunteer as the Early Childhood Ministry Director. The kids I serve are 0-kindergarten. We are currently relocating to a new building and making some changes in security issues and continuing to improve our "programming". For the past 5 yrs, we have used the Palma Smiley curriculum for the babies until they move up around 2yrs. It is wonderful material. During the worship hours, the preschoolers participate in their own worship using Promiseland's "In the Beginning" material. We are going to change the SS curriculum for the preschoolers in the Spring to David C. Cook curriculum. We also plan to add additional activities forthe kids and their families once we relocate. We are in the central Georgia area and I am always interested in sharing ideas with others in this ministry.

[Tom Reusch]

The biggest issue keeping me from turning our 3 nursery rooms (3 months to walking) (walkers and ones) (2 years olds) into classroom environments is that these classes would have to be open 3 times a week (sun morn, sun night, wed night). It makes my head spin at the thought of trying to recruit a group of teachers who will run a class 3 times a week. That's essentially more 'teaching time' than I have in a week and I'm paid to be here.

I know you just wanted to 'connect', but I 'connect' best through sharing struggle. :) And also through word imagery....Salad Swing.

[Staci Allen]

I, too, am involved in the nursery ministry. We are about to make some much needed changes in the nursery. We currently have 2 small rooms that we use for children 0 - young 2's. Our older 2's are in a SS class next door. We have had a boom of young families visit and join so therefore we are needing to spread out! I am planning to separate based on crawlers/walkers/toddlers. Would love to hear from others for advice and suggestions!

[Mary Lynn Wooters]

We are making some changes when we relocate to a new bldg. We will have one room of newborns -10 mos and the other will be 10-24 mos .We will move the children to the preschool rooms if they are 2 yrs by Aug 1(keeping with our school system). Then have 2-3 and 4s-kindergarten (anticipate separating these groups into 4 groups within yr due to growth)
We will initially teach Palma Smiley curriculum to the 10-24 mos and hope to add a table to the newborn -10 mos room within 6 mos (need more teachers). We tried once before to separate the newborns until crawling but did not have adequate spacing for the kids, so we had newborns- 2 or 2.5 yrs olds in one room.

[Staci Allen]

How do you have your nursery staffed? This is what I am struggling with ... And what is Palma Smiley? I've not heard of that curriculum.

Staci Allen said:

Mary Lynn Wooters said:

We are making some changes when we relocate to a new bldg. We will have one room of newborns -10 mos and the other will be 10-24 mos .We will move the children to the preschool rooms if they are 2 yrs by Aug 1(keeping with our school system). Then have 2-3 and 4s-kindergarten (anticipate separating these groups into 4 groups within yr due to growth)
We will initially teach Palma Smiley curriculum to the 10-24 mos and hope to add a table to the newborn -10 mos room within 6 mos (need more teachers). We tried once before to separate the newborns until crawling but did not have adequate spacing for the kids, so we had newborns- 2 or 2.5 yrs olds in one room.

[Mary Lynn Wooters]

We insist that a minimum of 2 adults are in each room with children- even if it is only 1 child. We do not open any rooms unless 2 adults are in the room to accept the kids. For the newborn-10 mos. we also maintain a 1:3 ratio. So if we have 7 -9 babies we call for extra help. I actually try to go have 3-4 people scheduled for each hour in this room - a lot of my volunteers are husband/wife teams. In the 10-24 mos room the ratio is 1:4 - not much of an increase. Again 2 adult minimum rule applies. The older groups are 1:6 and then 1:8. We are asking all of our parents to serve at least one hour a month - we have 2 hours currently. Not ideal but necessary as we are experiencing lots of growth and with our relocation anticipating large numbers of young families to come.
Palma Smiley is a curriculum written 40 yrs ago by Palma Smiley from Lubbuck, TX. It is wonderful!! We have used it for 5 yrs and it is amazing to see the babies pat the Bible and wonderful to hear stories of them patting a Bible at home and often one of their first words is Bible. It uses soft rubber toys for them to hold, chew, throw while the teacher sings little songs to tunes like "Mary Had a Little Lamb".The songs are about the object they are holding. It teaches the body parts- Lots of "Thank you,God for my hands to pat the ..." etc. There are 4 units;God Made Me, Families, Creation, Baby Jesus. She sells the units around $200 each but it comes with the toys, the mechanical toys, puppets, books, other hands on items and the curriculum book. It is all reusuable so after the investment, you would use it forever if stored properly i.e. away from the other toys in the room. I don't have her website handy but you should be able to do a search for her and find her. If not, let me know and I will get her website and phone no. for you.

[Staci Allen]

Palma Smiley sounds like fun. I will check it out! Thanks!

Mary Lynn Wooters said:

We insist that a minimum of 2 adults are in each room with children- even if it is only 1 child. We do not open any rooms unless 2 adults are in the room to accept the kids. For the newborn-10 mos. we also maintain a 1:3 ratio. So if we have 7 -9 babies we call for extra help. I actually try to go have 3-4 people scheduled for each hour in this room - a lot of my volunteers are husband/wife teams. In the 10-24 mos room the ratio is 1:4 - not much of an increase. Again 2 adult minimum rule applies. The older groups are 1:6 and then 1:8. We are asking all of our parents to serve at least one hour a month - we have 2 hours currently. Not ideal but necessary as we are experiencing lots of growth and with our relocation anticipating large numbers of young families to come.
Palma Smiley is a curriculum written 40 yrs ago by Palma Smiley from Lubbuck, TX. It is wonderful!! We have used it for 5 yrs and it is amazing to see the babies pat the Bible and wonderful to hear stories of them patting a Bible at home and often one of their first words is Bible. It uses soft rubber toys for them to hold, chew, throw while the teacher sings little songs to tunes like "Mary Had a Little Lamb".The songs are about the object they are holding. It teaches the body parts- Lots of "Thank you,God for my hands to pat the ..." etc. There are 4 units;God Made Me, Families, Creation, Baby Jesus. She sells the units around $200 each but it comes with the toys, the mechanical toys, puppets, books, other hands on items and the curriculum book. It is all reusuable so after the investment, you would use it forever if stored properly i.e. away from the other toys in the room. I don't have her website handy but you should be able to do a search for her and find her. If not, let me know and I will get her website and phone no. for you.

[Betsy]

Have you heard of Sunlight Kids? It came out last year from GPH. The full-year, reusable kit is aimed at birth through 36 months. It's really neat to see even the littlest of children learn about Jesus. You can check it out at www.gph.org/sunlightkids.