Home Education and The Preschooler

Although I believe strongly that children should be taught as much as possible, as young as possible, I also believe this teaching should take place in a fun and non-pressured environment. I have never set my children down to learn their colors, numbers, or shapes. They pick those up pretty easily in day to day life. Once in a while we do traditional "preschool" activities because they are fun, but not because I think they are necessary.

My children begin "formal" schooling between the ages of 3 and 4, depending on the child, learning phonics in a relaxed way while continuing natural every day learning. Additional learning is introduced casually. I try to bring home books from the library on things that interest my children, but I also use books to introduce them to new interests. Counting and math are learned with manipulatives and games; science and history through crafts, experiments, field trips, and nature walks. Geography studies are really fun to do with little ones because you can play games, do crafts, fix foods, listen to music, and wear costumes.

I try to limit writing as much as possible. Children don't usually have the physical skills for writing until about age 6, and I gave my older children a permanent dislike of writing by pushing too much too soon. Drawing is a fun alternative way to practice these skills, without the pressure (especially drawing exercises where they are supposed to copy step-by-step). Mazes and dot-to-dots also help them to practice pencil control. There are many ways to use notebooking with younger children who aren't writing yet.

Because young children absorb things so easily, it makes sense to include them whenever possible while you are teaching the older children. It also solves the problem of "what to do with the little ones" during school hours. However, it is also good to have some alternatives for the times when it won't work to include them.

Some of the solutions we have come up with are:

1. Take advantage of nap times.
2. Have the older children take turns entertaining the younger ones while you give one-on-one attention to your older students.
3. Teach the little ones to sit quietly for short periods of time and read or color.
4. Have special toys and activities prepared which the little ones can only use during these times.
5. Place them in a safe area (a playpen or their bedroom which is closed off with a baby gate) and allow them to play by themselves while you work with the others.
6. Give them a snack (or scatter cereal or chocolate chips on the floor for a scavenger hunt- they eat off the floor when you aren't watching anyway)

Sometimes, the baby is the lesson

Preschoolers add a lot of noise and chaos to the homeschool. However, their ability to absorb information and their excitement over learning adds sparkle to the learning environment. Sometimes it is necessary to use distraction techniques in order to get the lessons done. But sometimes, the baby is the lesson. Enjoy the days with preschoolers in your homeschool. They will be gone too soon.

Father's Day Project {free printable}

I know we haven't even celebrated Mother's Day yet, but since I AM the mother I don't really have much to do with preparing for that holiday. So, on to Father's Day! Being that I'm usually running behind, you will have to excuse me for actually being early for a change.

I wrote this poem for my husband almost 14 years ago, when my oldest two children were just babies, and put in on a card with pictures of my sons wearing their Papa's boots and  "working" with him around our yard. After seeing a Father's Day project which included a cut-out of a child's shoe print glued inside his father's shoe print, I decided to create a similar Father's Day project for my toddler. (I'd recommend using ink, if possible. I wasn't really happy with the results I got using paint. But maybe it was just because I was trying to take pictures at the same time.)

If you'd like to make your own Father's Day craft, you can download the PDF file of the poem below.

Papa's Feet Poem
Daddy's Feet Poem

o is for owl

I usually spend Saturdays preparing meals for Sunday. But, since I got most of my cooking done yesterday, I had time to do a craft with CJ instead. I printed out the parts for a cute little owl using free templates from the Lakeshore Learning website. When my oldest daughter saw what we were doing, she said, "He's up to o already?"

I explained to her that this not for his abc notebook, it was a different project. But then I thought, "Why not?" So our owl got glued to a notebook page. I used the scraps cut from the owl's body as a stencil to draw an o, making it about 1 cm. smaller around the outside edge. We glued the o on top of the owl and our notebook page was done!




 My "stencil." Can you see the cuts along
 the edges where CJ was practicing his
scissors skills?

The owl was a bit big for the page, but I think it is still cute.



Color Sorting With Paint Sample Cards {free printable}

Here is another activity I put together to keep the toddler busy during school hours. I found this idea at Walking By the Way, the blog written by Ami of Homeschool Share. She even created a grid that you can download. But I don't have any colored ink in the printer right now and I wanted to use different colors than she did. So I made my own.

All you need is some paint color sample cards, a scissors, a color sorting chart (and colored pencils if you print in black and white), and a laminator. I used some Scotch brand self-laminating pouches that I purchased a while ago.

Unfortunately, this activity is a bit too advanced for CJ. But his older sister had fun with it!  Maybe I should have tried the simpler activity I found on the Chasing Cheerios blog.

color sorting chart

black and white color sorting chart

How To Make Colored Rice

I had two problems. First, we were given a five pound bucket of white rice- leftovers from y2k. I know rice keeps for a long time, but the idea of eating food that is more than ten years old doesn't really appeal to me, especially since we try to avoid white rice anyway. Second, I have a two year old who needs to be kept busy while we are doing lessons. What to do? Why not dye the rice and let my son play with it?

Children love the feel of rice. It is great for pouring and measuring practice. Or it can be glued to cardstock to create collage pictures. A cookie sheet covered in colored rice is a great place to practice writing the alphabet, or for driving toy cars.

I had seen several recipes for coloring rice that involved the use of rubbing alcohol, but I wanted something a little less toxic. Once again, Google proved to be a valuable friend and I was able to locate directions which were more toddler friendly.

What You Need:

2 cups white rice
2 T. white vinegar
10 drops food coloring
quart mason jar with lid
cookie sheet
aluminum foil

Measure the rice into the jar. (If you are feeling particularly patient, your toddler would love to help with this.) Add vinegar and food coloring. Screw lid onto jar and shake until rice is evenly colored. Line cookie sheet with foil. Pour rice onto foil and bake in a 200 degree oven for about 30 minutes, or until rice is dry. Allow to cool. Store in a closed container.

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Keeping Toddlers Busy

 

It's been a while since we last had a toddler around. I'm not sure what I did to entertain the little ones in the past. I guess it was easier because the other children always had a playmate close to their age. Since there is a four and a half year differnce between our little Cracker Jack and the previous "baby", I've had to come up with some creative ways to keep him busy while his older siblings are busy learning.

One of his favorite activities is finger painting. He's never been one to put things in his mouth, but just to be safe I use ketchup and mustard. He likes this twice as much because he has fun smearing it and he gets a little treat.  His masterpieces aren't really suitable for keeping (in fact, they are usually nothing more than a smear of "paint" that soaked in before he could eat it), but he has fun and it keeps him out of trouble.

 Another thing which will keep him entertained for at least a half hour is a container of water, a spoon, and a few of his plastic animals. After he is through splashing, I give him a towel and he wipes up all the drips. This is a good activity to do after finger painting because the water washes up the paint mess.

He also enjoys putting coins into his piggy bank. It is way for him to practice manual dexterity and, since I tell him the names of the coins as he drops them in the bank, he is learning something about money. I haven't used this during school hours, though I suppose a roll of pennies could keep him busy while I helped the younger children with lapbooks or something that we could do while we sat by him at a table.

We also try to include him in as many things as we can. He loves snuggling, so I can usually get him to sit quietly in my lap while we are reading. And when he won't sit still, one of the older children will sometimes take him into his bedroom to play while they sit on his bed and do their reading.

What do you do to keep your toddlers busy?