Creating an environment for children, and providers, to thrive
By Brenda Novack, owner of Little Wonders Child Care
Brenda Novack takes full advantage of the continuing education opportunities that SMIF provides for child care providers and other Early Childhood professionals in the region.
Little Wonders Child Care, which is my family-based program, has been open for 14 years, and I have been in the child care field for 27 years. Two years ago, I bought the home next to mine, so I now operate my child care program out of a second home. It has its own playground and everything in the house is all geared toward the kids. Since it’s a separate building, I don’t have to live and breathe my business like I did 27 years ago.
I have taken many of the classes that Southern Minnesota Initiative Foundation (SMIF) offers to childcare providers. I take a lot of trainings to enhance my program. I always go into a training with the idea that I want to learn one new thing, and I want to take something back and rejuvenate my program. I’ve definitely done that through the training opportunities from SMIF.
I took the S.M.A.R.T. Steps class, which supports body movements for healthy brain development and can help with challenging behaviors. I loved that class so much that they asked me to come back and help facilitate chat sessions. I incorporate S.M.A.R.T. every day into what I do with my kids. We’re constantly working on building our cores, on the floor jumping, crawling and using the large motor development movements. Using the tools from that class has really helped me manage behaviors. At this point, I would call my childcare a S.M.A.R.T. program.
A young child uses the Feeling Buddies from the Conscious Discipline program to help regulate emotions.
I have taken the Conscious Discipline class twice, which addresses behavioral challenges in compassionate ways. The first time I took it, I had a little girl whose mom was deployed. I was really struggling with her on how to meet her needs. I was thinking outside the box on how to handle the separation for her because she was very attached to her mom. Conscious Discipline helped by gave me some tools to help her. We did Brain Breaks which I still love to do with the kids. It’s a C.D. of different songs and it helps the kids move in different ways. Another thing I did was develop a special space just for her. I had her bring a favorite stuffy from home as well as using the feeling dolls and poster that Conscious Discipline recommends. Her mom flew the United States flag in honor of Little Wonders Childcare over the base. When mom returned home she presented us with the flag and a special certificate.
In the fall of 2023, I took a training about working with children with ADHD which was part of SMIF’s Dine and Learn series. I took the class with one particular child in mind who has not been diagnosed with ADHD, but has a lot of the aspects of it, so I wanted to take it and learn a little more about it. I learned something important, that when people think about ADHD they think about the hyper end of it. And the trainer mentioned that there can be a difference in how boys and girls act when they have ADHD – that girls can be a little quieter and tend to daydream more. They tend to be the ones who get overlooked if they have ADHD because the teachers and parents don’t recognize it.
Brenda reads a book to her child care kids about different ways to calm down.
It means a lot that we have this option in our region for providers to take trainings. I get to connect with other providers in this area, not just throughout the state. I really do enjoy both the online and the in-person trainings. It’s really nice to be able to sit down at a table with a group of other professionals in the field, and if I’ve had a rough day, I can look at someone next to me and we can bounce ideas off each other on how to handle things.
Having SMIF offer these trainings to us, it shows that our profession is being valued, which is huge. It’s something that most people don’t acknowledge. So this is a positive message that says, “Hey, we value you and we want you to be able to fulfill your trainings that the State is requiring you to keep your license up to date.” When the trainings are offered, I always ask myself, do I need this for my license? Or, is this class run by a trainer that I really enjoy listening to? Sometimes I might just go and listen to that training one more time because I might learn something new. I would just like to thank SMIF for offering these classes.
This story is from SMIF’s 2024 Impact Report. To read the other stories from the report, and to view maps showing the impact of these programs, visit smifoundation.org/impactreport.
