The great thing about designing and making bulletin boards with kids is that each theme presents new opportunities to enhance language skills, fine motor skills through arts and crafts, social skills as the children build together, and so on.

The first step in creating a bulletin board is to come up with a theme for the bulletin board. Use bright colors and bold letterings on the board. Decorate it with pictures cut from old magazines or newspapers, graphics downloaded from the internet, stickers, stamps, laces, fabrics, old greeting cards, and so on.

Here are some interesting ideas for bulletin boards:

• Baby Pictures: Collect baby pictures as well as current pictures of the children in your daycare. Decorate a bulletin board with blue and pink glitter, ribbons and lace. Divide the board in two halves by sticking a ribbon that runs through the middle of the board. On one side of the board, stick baby pictures and on the other stick the current pictures, in any order. Name the pictures and let the kids match the baby pictures to the current ones.

• Recommended Reading: Decorate the bulletin board in such a way that it resembles a giant book. Give each child pastel color papers cut in the shape of a miniature open book. Ask them to write a small report on their favorite book and why they recommend it.

• My favorite vacation: Ask children to bring a favorite picture of them on a vacation they enjoyed. Stick it on a bulletin board decorated with various travel pictures and quotes. Invite the children to talk about their travel experience and why they enjoyed it.

• My favorite animal: Make different sections on the bulletin board to create a zoo on it. Ask each child to draw a picture of his/her favorite animal or bring a picture of the animal. Under the title '___'s favorite animal is ____' stick the picture and let the children talk about their favorite animals. You can also make bulletin boards based on flowers, trees, fish, birds, and so on.

• 50 states: Use the US map as the theme for your bulletin board. Assign each child a state and ask them to find out 5 facts about the state such as: state capital, official fruit, official flower, official animal and a picture of the official state map.

• Birthday Board: Draw clouds/flowers representing each month of the year and write in the names and birth dates of the children for each month. You often refer to the birthday throughout the year and it saves time, instead of looking it up all the time.

• Learn the rainbow: Paint a rainbow and assign each color to a child and encourage the children to list 5 items in that color. Ask them to draw or pictures of the item and stick it next to the color. Include the child's name along with the pictures. For example lemon, sunflower, sun, yellow bell pepper and pineapple for the color yellow, and so on. If talking with your child about adoption is difficult, talk to a child and adolescent psychiatrist who can be a valuable source of support and understanding.

Copyright 2001, 2004. All rights reserved. Any reproduction of this article in whole or in part without written or verbal permission is strictly prohibited. For information about reprinting this article, contact the copyright owner: Vanessa Rasmussen, Ph.D, Starting a Day Care Center, http://www.startingadaycarecenter.com.