Many young children love "make-believe" or "pretend" play. By ages 3-5, this grows into dramatic play, where children act out roles, interact with one another in those roles, and plan how the play will go. How do you keep dramatic play fresh and fun? Carefully watching the actors and their interactions will help you to know when it is important to offer verbal cues (“What does your role do?” “What happens next?” “What if …?”) and when it is best to let the children direct their own play.
Dramatic play can be stimulated by the teacher’s timely questions and suggestions, but too much intervention can result in a teacher-directed activity and the children’s initiative will be crushed. How can you carefully stimulate but not smother children’s play? Tools of the Mind offers nine interventions that foster more mature levels of play.
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What to Do About the Flu?
As the fall flu season approaches, concerns will surface about the highly contagious H1N1 influenza (also known as swine flu). Information about the upcoming flu is at the www.flu.gov website. Readers of the CounciLINK will find this section especially helpful: the Child Care and Preschool Pandemic Influenza Planning Checklist at http://www.flu.gov/plan/school/preschool.html. It has ideas for planning your response, suggestions for parents, and tips to keep workplace flu infections to a minimum.
 "Spending Time Outdoors with Your Child" is a particularly relevant one that parents may enjoy. Summer is the perfect time to get in the habit of going outside! 
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