Lakeshore Learning offers free lesson plans in three grade categories: Pre-K & K; 1st & 2nd; and 3rd - 5th. These would also be great to have on hand for the summer months, when the school-going kids are home.
The first part of this pregnancy has been pretty rough for me and I haven’t spent near the time I should have on preschool stuff with Lil Roo. I know too much screen time is NOT a good thing, but I’ve learned he is a visual learner (and duplicator). I tried forever to get him to say the ABCs. He finally would say the last part of the alphabet, but nothing more. Then one day we turned on Super Why and I swear it was no time before he was saying the whole alphabet like it was nothing. As lame as it is, quality programming during screen time has filled in a little bit of the gap for me.
He really loves worksheets, so my goal is to get back on those as I feel a little better moving toward the middle of the pregnancy. I need to create 2 different stacks - one of things he can do with no instruction or guidance and another that I need to sit down with him and talk about as he works on it (or at least initially explain the concept of what he is suppose to do). Those from the first stack I can hand him even when I feel my worst, lol.
Once I am more up and going, feeling much less sick, and getting some actual energy, I would like to focus on doing more crafts, playing more board games, more interactive stuff.
Writing is a big thing we need to work on. I’m not sure where 3, almost 4 year olds should be in this regard, and I am sure it varies widely, but I’d like to find some base to go off of. This is the area we’ve worked in the LEAST, so it seems obvious it is now the area we need to work on the MOST.
I have 3 stackable large plastic drawers in the living room that house his board games and puzzles (but looks like I need to buy a fourth!). Puzzles were once on a lower shelf in his room until I came to realize what. a. very. bad. idea. that was, lol. I reclaimed a 3 drawer plastic cart from elsewhere in the house (much smaller drawers than the ones the games are in) and I plan to use that for learning materials, etc. I just pulled it out, so I am in the process of gathering the materials I already have. I just purchased this Letter Of The Week kit w/ lesson plans (found the link on this post, which has other homeschool resources linked also).
AND A TIME FOR PLAY…..
We are also in the process of moving all the yard toys to the backyard from the side yard and I am discovering we have hit an “in-between” stage. He is outgrowing some of the play items (slides and whatnot) but “bigger kid” yard stuff seems too big for him. Looks like I am also on a quest to find something that will work for him now, and also grow with him (and oh, yeah, not cost us half what the house is worth, lol).
Outline / Recap / Pics:
Week One:
Cows, A, 1, Square
Theme: Cows
Vocab Word: Calf
Nursery Rhyme: Hey Diddle Diddle
Letter: A
Number: 1
Shape/Color: Square
Monday: Gross Motor Skill: Act like a cow
Tuesday: Shape/Color: Square
Wednesday: Letter: A
Thursday: Number: 1
Friday: Fine Motor Skill: Make a cow with squares
Gross Motor Skill: Act like a cow:
Put on music and move around like a cow, including sound effects
Fine Motor Skill: Make a cow with squares:
You will need some white and black paper. Cut out one 4? square of white for the body, one 2? square of white for the head, about nine 1? squares of white to make the legs and tail, three or four 1? squares of black for the cows spots, and three or more 1/2? squares for the eye, ears, etc. in black. Help your child glue the cow together on another sheet of paper (of a different color).
Our Learning Poster:
The Learning Poster (info from LOTW)
Some Materials We Used:
Letter Of The Week Link:
Week One Lesson Plan – Includes the simple “lesson plan” for each day; vocabulary word; suggested books, poems, and songs.
Related Links:
Download Weeks 1-4 Calendar (Note: This is currently dated according to my schedule of the curriculum, but I will be adding an undated calendar and will update the link when I do.)
Cow Coloring Page (printable)
Cow Coloring Pages (more printables)
Hey Diddle Diddle Nursery Rhyme Printable Page
Thank you Tammy for some of the cow activity links.
We are doing Letter Of The Week’s Brightly Beaming Preschool Preparatory Curriculum (Curriculum Outline) with the two year old.
I’ll post off and on about it and at the end of each week’s lesson plan, I’ll post the basic lesson plan & recap with links, pics and info. If you are starting this curriculum at a different time that I did, hopefully this will be a help to you.
LOTW BB PRESCHOOL PREPARATORY CURRICULUM:
Related Links:
Alphabites – Activities for all letters of the alphabet
Bible ABC’s
Letter Printouts
Number Buddies
See all of my Preschool At Home posts.
Our Preschool At Home theme for week one is COWS.
Vocabulary word: CALF
Nursery Rhyme: Hey Diddle Diddle
Create the learning poster for the week.
MONDAY – Gross Motor Skills
Put on music and move around like a cow, including sound effects.
Square
A
1
FRIDAY – Fine Motor Skills
Build a cow with squares. You will need some white and black paper. Cut out one 4″ square of white for the body, one 2″ square of white for the head, about nine 1″ squares of white to make the legs and tail, three or four 1″ squares of black for the cows spots, and three or more 1/2″ squares for the eye, ears, etc. in black. Help your child glue the cow together on another sheet of paper (of a different color).
If you go to the days of the week links, you may notice a bit more detail. I may or may not be doing everything listed on each of those days. I will be following the basic outline for each week. Beyond that we will just take it one day at a time.
This information is based on the Brightly Beaming Preschool Preparatory Curriculum (Curriculum Outline) at Letter Of The Week.
You may download the September Calendar (weeks one through four) I created if you would like to follow along. If you are starting this curriculum at a different time, you can remove the month name and dates and still use the calendar as a guide.
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A few related links:
http://www.dltk-teach.com/numbers/color/index.htm
http://www.dltk-teach.com/rhymes/heydiddle/bheydiddleposter.gif
Thank you to Tammy & LaDonna for these links. I have quite a few others saved & will be posting a list of learning / activity resources for toddlers & preschoolers in the near future.
I’m doing it! I have found a free curriculum online for my two year old. I am going to start it Monday! Thankfully, I am not alone. I will have several friends starting it with their 2 year olds as well. Let’s hear it for the babes of 2006 – they are growing up!
The curriculum is very basic and works for me. It seemed overwhelming at first, until I sat down and created a calendar and suddenly it was actually very simple.
You may have heard of the website or the specific curriculum already… It is Brightly Beaming (Preschool Prepatory) by Letter Of The Week and is geared toward 2 – 4 year olds. It is a 26-week plan, with a weekly theme and a specific “subject” each day. There is also a weekly vocabulary word, weekly nursery rhyme, as well as a list of suggested books, poems, and music to coordinate with the weekly theme.
Mondays: Gross motor skills
Tuesdays: Shapes / Colors
Wednesdays: Letter of the day
Thursdays: Number of the day
Fridays: Fine motor skills
This is completely casual – because I couldn’t manage it any other way right now, LOL. If you want to give it a try too, I’d love to have even more company. Feel free to comment, here or on future Preschool At Home posts. I’d love to hear ideas, how it is working for you, what you may be doing with your toddler / preschooler if something different, etc.
You can download a copy of the calendar here: Preschool At Home – September 2008.
The calendar is something I personally created based on the curriculum, just to keep me organized and to keep me from feeling overwhelmed by the mass amounts of info on the site. On Sundays I have the week #, theme, and vocab word and on Saturdays, the name of the weekly nursery rhyme. The other days are as outlined in the lesson plans.
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