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It doesn't seem possible that back to school time is almost here. Today I am teaming up with the bloggers of iHomeschool Network to share our tot-school routine and activity choices for this coming “school” year.
We are literally days away from welcoming baby no. 2 into the family as well. So while I don't plan on starting any official tot-school routine and activities until September, I already have a good idea what we will be doing this year, so I thought I would share. Thanks to nesting to getting me prepared ahead of time.
Our Tot-School Routine
Last year I posted our tot-school routine and schedule and also our tot-school activity choices for ages 2-3. around the same time of year. Ellie had just turned 2 at this point and we did pretty well sticking to this routine until I became pregnant in November. At that point any hint of routine went out the window since I spent most of the first 5 months trying to keep food down or feeling so tired I could barely function.
This year with a new baby we are going to be taking things a lot less time stringent and just go with a basic routine, not based on times of day. I think this will work a lot better for us since we have also been dealing with sleep regressions and potty training, on top of new little brother joining the ranks.
So here is our basic routine that we will follow for the day:
- Wake up (Ellie will pick out her clothes for the day and get dressed)
- Breakfast (Ellie usually chooses what she wants to eat or picks between 2-3 options)
- Clean up and Bible time
- Morning tot-school activity (either an introduction to a new activity OR allowing her to choose activities from our Montessori inspired shelves)
- Reading Time
- Morning screen time (either an educational T.V. program or iPad app) OR outside time depending on the season/weather
- Lunch
- Quiet time (she has access to books and a few quieter toys in her room for this time)
- Snack
- Free time (either more activities from her shelves if she chooses, reading, outside time, etc) I typically do not allow any more screen time at this point, but we do listen to music streaming on our T.V.
- Supper with daddy
- Wind down time before bed
- Bedtime (since she usually doesn't nap anymore, we do an early bedtime, typically between 7:00-7:30pm).
This is all going to be VERY fluid of course. With a new baby in the mix, I am SURE things will change. I also hope to get her into some tumbling classes and possibly library story time so those things will just fit in and replace parts of our day as they happen.
Our Tot-School Activities and Ideas
These are some of the basic things I will be using the plan our activities for the year.
I love planners, so I turned to the Weekly Homeschool Planner from Homeschool Creations to plan our year.
In the planner I have our activities divided up into these themes:
- Bible
- Practical Life
- Fine Motor
- Sensory
- Prewriting
- Gross Motor
- Reading/Math
- Craft
We won't be doing each of these each day, but many of them will be out on our Montessori inspired shelves so she can have access to them throughout the week. On the back I also included the boxes with items we will need each week and places for me to write notes and observations about how she does with the activities.
I am also planning on a 6 weeks “on” 1 week “off” routine as far as planning activities. We will officially start the week after Labor day and with it ending in May to June of 2016.
We will also be following a letter of week routine to go with the above areas of focus, very similar to the ones shared in The Preschool Journey ebook by my friend Angela over Teaching Mama.
She has activity ideas to go along with each week and letter so we will be doing some of those, as well as adding in some extra items. Each of the areas above I will theme around the letter we choose to focus on each week.
We will also be using the Little Letter Books from The Measured Mom for part of our reading each week.
For Bible we will be using a combo of our churches' Beginner Sabbath School lesson and memory verse which is the same lesson for a month. They also provide craft ideas in the lesson, so I will be pulling one of those to complete each week at home.
During the Christmas and Easter season we will also be using Truth in the Tinsel and Sense of the Resurrection from Oh Amanda.
Some other resources I will be pulling from for the year include the following below:
- Every Parent Can Teach Their Toddler | ebook/PDF | Kindle | Print
- Learn with Play – 150 Activities for Year Round Fun & Learning | ebook/PDF | Kindle | Print
- Basic Shapes for Beginners – my own ebook on pre-writing lines and shapes | PDF Format |Kindle | Paperback Format
- 99 Fine Motor Ideas for ages 1 to 5 | Kindle | Print
I also have my tot-school Pinterest board that I am always pinning ideas to.
