Am I doing enough?

[5 Little Monkeys]

I think you are doing just fine! As you go along, you will pick up new ideas. Checking out this sight and pinterest will give you lots of ideas for activities and circle time. I agree that free play is important and it's definitely the direction some preschools and daycares are going. My only advice with free play....make sure there are educational toys out as well. I hate toys that have batteries in them and the kids just push buttons and wait for the toy to do something or a car that zooms on it's own instead of the child pushing it. I do have some of these toys in my daycare but I much prefer puzzles, blocks, books, cars that need to be pushed, lacing beads, hand eye coordination toys, dolls that make no noise etc. It gets the child using their imagination and makes them be physically active if they have to actually "use" they toy to have fun.

I usually do circle time after lunch, just before nap. Depending on the day, we will sometimes have a circle near the end of the day.

Some things I do for circle are:
*read books...discuss each page, what do they see, what does such and such say, can they find the purple ball etc
*sing songs...each child gets to pick a song and we have actions for most of them
*flashcards...I've been trying to do a theme a month and I have been making flashcards for each one. For example, this month is animals so I have made a dozen or so with pictures of animals. I ask them what this one is called and what does it say and where we would see it. I make doubles so that we can also play "memory" with them or "find the pair".
*a Friday afternoon circle time will be spent talking about what we are all going to do on the weekend
*Take a few smaller toys and a blanket. Show all the toys to the kids and discuss their name. Cover them up with the blanket and take one away. Ask the kids which one is missing. If they are older, you can keep doing this until their is just one toy left. Mine are young so I just take a different one away each time.