As I mentioned here, Liam and I have been doing a little preschool together in the mornings this summer. Well we were before all of the moving crazy began anyway. It quickly adopted the name "activities" because that sounds way more fun to a 3 year old than school. ;) The best part about it all is that Liam is loving it and it has been a great opportunity to spend one on one time together. It has also been fun for me to lesson plan again and help my own child to learn and develop skills necessary for him to be successful in preschool and then Kindergarten in a couple of years.
Each week we've had a theme that corresponds with a letter of the alphabet and all the activities I plan surround that particular theme. Every day we say he Pledge of Allegiance, read a book, do a letter activity, number activity, craft, learn a new skill, and do some kind of science experiment or make something together. Here's a sample of my lesson plans and a little look into what he has learned so far ...
Week 1 - A is for ANIMALS
This first week we read mostly nonfiction books and magazines about different kinds of animals. Our favorite fact we learned was that a group of jellyfish is called a smack! We excavated animals from ice with a hammer and a screwdriver, smothered a pig with mud "to keep it cool" (brown paint, sand, and oats), used dot markers to trace the letter A, and so much more!
Week 2 - B is for BUGS
I created this theme because Liam is afraid of most bugs. My hope was that by the end of the week, he would see all the amazing things that bugs do and be a little less afraid but I don't think my mission was accomplished. We did have a fun week together none-the-less. haha He practiced his fine motor skills by threading this string to make a spider web ...
He also had a pretty yummy snack to go with it! ;)
He made a silly bug hat and got his very own bug catching kit that I found at the dollar store to go bug hunting with! His job was to find the bugs and my job was to catch all the bugs for him. haha
The moth we found hanging out on our fence ...
Recognizing capital letters versus lower case letters ...
Week 3 - C is for CARS
This was such a fun week and I found so many great resources for it compiled here! We taped markers to the backs of all different kinds of vehicles and he practiced tracing the letter "c".
I set up a fun car washing station for him where I covered his matchbox cars with flour and he had to use soap and water to clean them. :)
Week 4 was D is for Dinosaurs and week 5 was E is for Emotions. This was right about the time that the house selling process got crazy so unfortunately I didn't get any pictures from either week but we did all kinds of activities! During the dinosaur week he learned about several different kinds of dinosaurs and made puppets for each one out of paper bags. We did a science experiment together that he LOVED where I made eggs out of baking soda and shampoo with a toy dinosaur inside each one and he had to hatch the eggs by pouring vinegar over the top of each one and watched them fizz.
During emotions week we watched the movie Inside Out to start the conversation about our feelings and it was hysterical listening to Liam tell us when one of his toy cars was sad/mad/angry/happy and how to help them feel better in the week that followed! We played "Don't Eat the Emotion" with m&m's and all kinds of different faces.
These are just a few of so many fun memories from this summer preschool together!
If you are looking for a few ideas of your own to try with your kiddos, I've saved so many resources on my "Toddler Activities" Pinterest board so check it out! Enjoy these last few weeks of summer before preschool starts back up again! XO
Each week we've had a theme that corresponds with a letter of the alphabet and all the activities I plan surround that particular theme. Every day we say he Pledge of Allegiance, read a book, do a letter activity, number activity, craft, learn a new skill, and do some kind of science experiment or make something together. Here's a sample of my lesson plans and a little look into what he has learned so far ...
This first week we read mostly nonfiction books and magazines about different kinds of animals. Our favorite fact we learned was that a group of jellyfish is called a smack! We excavated animals from ice with a hammer and a screwdriver, smothered a pig with mud "to keep it cool" (brown paint, sand, and oats), used dot markers to trace the letter A, and so much more!
Week 2 - B is for BUGS
I created this theme because Liam is afraid of most bugs. My hope was that by the end of the week, he would see all the amazing things that bugs do and be a little less afraid but I don't think my mission was accomplished. We did have a fun week together none-the-less. haha He practiced his fine motor skills by threading this string to make a spider web ...
He also had a pretty yummy snack to go with it! ;)
He made a silly bug hat and got his very own bug catching kit that I found at the dollar store to go bug hunting with! His job was to find the bugs and my job was to catch all the bugs for him. haha
The moth we found hanging out on our fence ...
Recognizing capital letters versus lower case letters ...
Week 3 - C is for CARS
This was such a fun week and I found so many great resources for it compiled here! We taped markers to the backs of all different kinds of vehicles and he practiced tracing the letter "c".
I set up a fun car washing station for him where I covered his matchbox cars with flour and he had to use soap and water to clean them. :)
Week 4 was D is for Dinosaurs and week 5 was E is for Emotions. This was right about the time that the house selling process got crazy so unfortunately I didn't get any pictures from either week but we did all kinds of activities! During the dinosaur week he learned about several different kinds of dinosaurs and made puppets for each one out of paper bags. We did a science experiment together that he LOVED where I made eggs out of baking soda and shampoo with a toy dinosaur inside each one and he had to hatch the eggs by pouring vinegar over the top of each one and watched them fizz.
During emotions week we watched the movie Inside Out to start the conversation about our feelings and it was hysterical listening to Liam tell us when one of his toy cars was sad/mad/angry/happy and how to help them feel better in the week that followed! We played "Don't Eat the Emotion" with m&m's and all kinds of different faces.
These are just a few of so many fun memories from this summer preschool together!
If you are looking for a few ideas of your own to try with your kiddos, I've saved so many resources on my "Toddler Activities" Pinterest board so check it out! Enjoy these last few weeks of summer before preschool starts back up again! XO
Such fun activities! How do you make time (and have energy) to do all that each day with 2 kids?! I can barely get one activity in each day.
ReplyDeleteI completely understand where you are coming from! The reality is, I'm definitely not perfect at it every day. Some activities have to spill over into other days and some days we aren't able to get to anything at all. I've learned to have grace with myself for all different kinds of days. it has definitely taken sacrifice on my little bit of personal time each day to prepare but it is worth it to me because otherwise I tend to rely more on screen time than I would if I was prepared.
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