My Daycare Space

[DCMomOf3]

I have a large room I use for daycare and right now I have 18 mo. to 3 years and a couple of SA. I have an open concept (no heavily defined stations) and am wondering what you think? I like the open feel but every few months I tend to rearrange, so I guess I haven't come up with a perfect layout yet. Also, I am not sure I like how i have my walls.

[TGT09]

Very cute and much like I would LOVE for mine to look like in another year or so.

[Live and Learn]

nice Quincy, thanks for sharing!

[WImom]

I love it. I need to get some reading chairs like those.

[sierrastreasures]

Wow a lot of thought went into planning this room/space.

I wish we could create an album in this forum showing the different setups we all have.

[Crystal]

Very nice! I redo my space every few months too. I don't move big furnishings anymore, but I do move other stuff around. I love the open concept for larger movement activities. I have found setting it up in centers gives the children more "focus" and they are less rowdy, but there have been several times I have opened it all up and had it more like yours so they could have more space to move about freely. Nice work

[Abigail]

DCMomOf3: You have a nice area. Is this your main daycare space? I like that you have colored walls because so many people just leave them white! The one thing I noticed though is that everything seems so "Square", even everything on your walls in rectangular or square besides the tree cut outs. I would put up 123's or Abc's that are the actual shape. PM me if you have any specific questions because I love figuring out room set-ups!

Reading/Quiet Zone--even though you may not have issues with children wanting a small quiet area I would recommend you switch a few things around. I would switch your baby/kitchen dramatic play area with your bookcase and couches. Put the couches along each wall in the corner to prevent the kids from wanting to move them if they're away from the wall. Have the book shelf facing the tan colored wall where one of the two couches would be against. This creates a corner area with two comfy couches and the reading books. You could also put the baby bed/changing area and the play kitchen facing out from the wall, but keep them back to back to bring things away from the wall, but kept together so tipping them over shouldn't become an issue.

[DCMomOf3]

I haven't noticed the 'square'ness of my decorations before but you are right, everything has angles. I too used to have a more private reading area but got rid of it in my last rearragement. LOL

Do you think centers are age appropriate for 18 months? I have half of my crew that age and the other half 3 years old for the majority of my day.

[Crystal]

yes, centers are appropriate for 18 months. All of my babies are two and over now, but they participated in everything from the time they were crawling. As soon as they were able to sit in a chair, they began participaing in table activities, includng drawing, etc. My small materials are on the higher parts of the shelves and younger children's stuff are lower.