Dress Up Time!

Costumes are flying off the shelves in every store you walk into during this time in October. It's not only on Halloween that children like to dress up and play pretend, it's all year round!

Children are curious and will will take on roles such as a parent, soldier, or tiger. This is how they express their ideas and feelings about the world around them.

Jean Piaget, famous developmental psychologist, found that children are driven to explore and learn by exploring. He said that there are 4 periods of learning. The pre-operational period is when 2-7 year old children learn through pretend play. They start off assigning human attributes to inanimate objects such as having a doll or an imaginary friend. Then, their play becomes intuitive and much more involved as they grow.

So, we know it's good for them, but making ballerina, firemen, astronaut, and animal costumes could get tiring; especially for a pre-school teacher. Some costumes are very beautiful for one occasion, but are often intricate, scratchy, or impractical for a child to wear around the house to play in. I know there are plenty of mommies and daddies out there that have made an outfit or two out of tin foil, recycled paper bags, or paper plates. So what's a busy mommy or teacher to do?

Dress Up Time to the rescue! This is a company that sells simplistic felt costumes. These costumes are designed to "easily go on top of a child's regular clothes. The over-the-head design makes it easy for children to put on and take off so little assistance is needed. There are no hooks or buttons that require teacher's help."
These costumes are machine washable. They are also environmentally friendly using polyester felt made from recycled post-consumer plastic bottles.

I wish I knew about this company when I was teaching Kindergartners!

Dress Up Time is offering Mom's Best Bets readers a buy one get one free coupon. What great gifts for your pre-school teacher!