Starting Tot School

I have been trying to figure out something to do w/ babydoll. I know that she needs some one on one time w/ mommy. And I want her to have some opportunity to learn. In my "daily schedule" I even put a space for an educational activity. But I was having trouble coming up w/ ideas and implementing them successfully. Then I found Totally Tots and learned about Tot School.

The revolutionary thing about tot school for me was the word exposure. I am not trying to teach babydoll lessons but am trying to expose her to learning. With my academic inclination I felt like I needed to test her each time. Like if she didn't repeat that the duck was yellow it wasn't working. But that is not the point, having fun is the key and exposure to skills and concepts is the accomplishment.

So we started last week. Though I won't always do a theme, 4th of July seemed like a great idea. Especially since we had lots of 4th of July activities planned for the end of the week. We ended up doing not 4th of July stuff too.

So this is some of what we did:

U.S.A

We did U, S, and A letter sheets. They were easy to design on publisher. I just put the letter and one picture (like an umbrella on U) on the page. She colored these w/ red and blue crayons. Then I did another page w/ 3 other different umbrellas. I cut them out - she seems little for scissors, but watching me use her kids scissors is exposure. Then I taught her how to use the glue stick to glue them on. She was surprisingly good at it. I tried to not help as much as possible. She got the sequencing of the task down great! Here she is with her letter sheets:

We also did a parade one day. I got her toy drum and recorder and showed her how to march. The parade mostly consisted of her watching me march back and forth while I played the drum. She found it quite entertaining. When she finally decided to join in she slipped on the tile. In an effort to avoid tears I said a big "swoosh" as she slid across the tile on her bottom. She thought this was hilarious and she ended up running back and forth across the room sitting on the tile and saying "swoosh" As I said the point is fun. And she did go to the parade on Saturday. Though there wasn't much marching, mostly splashing, as it rained all day.

Learning "Toys"

We have a great set of word puzzles that I have now introduced her to. Before discovering Tot School I thought I needed to wait a few years to break this out. But I realized even though she couldn't read the words she loves puzzles. And the exposure to the idea of letters making words would be great.

Fine Motor

I found a great idea for putting pasta into a Tupperware shaker. she loves to carry the shaker around so I figured we might as well do something useful w/ it. I used tri-colored rotini, so we could practice colors too. She loved it! She took the pasta out and put it through the little hole for a long time. Then she started having more fun dumping it in and out. She even collected several other containers to dump into. It ended up entertaining her while I was making dinner too.

If you look behind her, on the fridge you can see the flag we made w/ construction paper practicing her new gluing skills too.

We also had a verse for the week, Psalm 119:45, posted on the fridge. Although babydoll didn't even repeat it, exposure is the key and Mommy memorized it!

We did good for the first week. We both enjoyed it and it didn't take a lot of extra time. We actually just made better use of our time.