Saturday, June 25, 2016

Week 1: Colors (Monday and Tuesday)

When I decided to start Tot School, I chose to do the first two themes that Kaitlyn over at Simply Learning did for her curriculum: colors and shapes. S had been sorting this shape sorter by color for awhile, so I wanted to expand his horizons! Most of the activities we did, I found on Pinterest!


Monday:

We began with singing the rainbow song from Barney, and I used some color bean bags that I found on the swap table in my teacher's lounge. Each day, S got better at grabbing the correct color bean bag.

Our first activity: color sensory bin sort


Materials:

  • Sterilite Bin
  • Black beans
  • Pattern blocks
  • Stacking cups
  • Unifix Cubes
At first, S was more interested in playing with the beans than actually sorting. I pulled this bin out almost every day and he caught on quickly to what he had to do. I kept reminding myself that the point of sensory bins is free play. He'd ask for this bin constantly!

Our second activity: do a dot rainbow!


Thanks to Pinterest, I found this neat rainbow printable over at Gift of Curiousity. She has some amazing printables that match all kinds of theme and are free!

Materials:
  • Do a Dot Markers
  • Rainbow Printable
  • Tray
This was S's first time working with Do A Dot Markers. He got the hang of them, but didn't really match the colors. He was just having fun stamping the dots all over the place. 

We ended up doing a third activity, because someone decided not to take a nap. :( His schedule was thrown off during the weekend with visits from family. 

It wasn't too hot, so I came up with this activity: Sidewalk Chalk Sort


Materials: 
  • Sidewalk chalk
  • Different objects in various colors
  • a sidewalk!
I drew different colored circles and brought out the objects from his sensory bin. He had a BLAST! At first I asked him where he thought the object would go, but after awhile he did it on his own. This was a repeat activity, but only in the late afternoon when it wasn't so hot!

Tuesday:
Next morning we sang our rainbow song again. We also read one of our color books that we checked out from the library. 

First activity: Water Bead Sort!


Materials:
  • Bin
  • Water Beads
  • Cups for sorting
I'm so glad that Kaitlyn mentioned that you need to let water beads soak over night. I soaked the whole bag, which in hindsight is TOTALLY unnecessary. They grow so big. My husband and I kept playing with them. 

Originally, I was just going to let him explore. I knew this would be tricky for S, because he's not the biggest fan of unusual textures (neither am I!) But once he got used to it, he loved squishing his hands in the beads. He went over to his shelf and grabbed the cups and handed them to me. I realized he wanted to sort them and he did well! I've even thrown some water beads in his water table for him to explore. They are awesome for building fine motor skills!

Our next activity: Cotton Ball Painting


Materials:

  • Washable paint
  • Cardstock
  • Cotton balls
  • Straws
  • Muffin tin
  • Tray
The night before, I cut the straws (leftover from a shower I threw!) and hot glued them onto the cotton balls. This made it much easier for S to grab. 

As you can see, we started this activity on the floor, but after an attempt at painting our cat (!) we moved to the high chair in our breakfast nook. 

He loved mixing the colors and putting the cotton balls on the paper. He also wanted to make sure the cotton balls went back to the correct color. 

I had planned on a daily snack to go with the theme. Tuesday's snack ended up being a fine motor activity as well. Fruit Loop Sort!


We had some Take Along bowls and lids that worked perfect for this. I gave him the pipe cleaner and showed him how to string the cereal. I was amazed at how quickly he picked up on this!

Along with a snack, I also let S watch some shows during lunch. I would talk with him about the colors we saw and what the characters were doing. Here are some of the ones we watched:

  • Bubble Guppies Season 1 Episode 2: The Crayon Prix
  • Blues Clues Season 5 Epsiode 2: Colors Everywhere
  • Peep and the Big Wide World: A Peep of a Different Color and Peep's Color Quest
I'll share what we did on Wednesday and Thursday in a different post. Comment below if you've tried any of these with your toddler!

Monday, June 20, 2016

So it begins...

Man, I've missed blogging. I used to keep one on the regular but then life happened. Marriage, kid, being a working mom.

So let me introduce myself. I'm Nilda, and I'm currently a third grade reading teacher in Jacksonville. I'm married to J, a computer engineer, and am a momma to S., an adorable 21 (almost 22!) month old. I thrive on structure, hence the whole teacher thing, so I knew that this summer I wanted to have fun with S but still have a structure that I could count on.

One of my favorite bloggers, Kaitlyn came back about a year ago, with her new blog and site, called Simply Learning. Here she detailed her plan to provide a tot school for her daughters. It intrigued me so I spent the last few months planning it all out.

The gist (ugh, I hate that word) of tot school is to provide thematic and developmentally appropriate activities for your toddler. We signed up S to go to PK2 in the fall. But I wanted to get a head start on some things, continue building on what S already knows and explore topics that he seems drawn towards.

Keeping those three ideas in mind, I chose the following themes for our tot school summer:

Week 1: Colors
Week 2: Shapes
Week 3: Body Parts
Week 4: Farm
Week 5: Ocean
Week 6: Transportation

I'm only doing 6 themes, because I have a shorter summer this year, plus J and I are going to be taking our first non-baby trip together in July. (WOOT!) Weeks 1-4 have a link to my individual Pinterest boards for each theme. On the boards you'll find which activities I will be doing. 

To plan out my weeks, I used this awesome free printable from Life with My Littles. It has space to plan out two activities daily as well as a snack. I'm a bit of a major planner nerd and I had these inserts from the1407planners, so I am able to keep track of each theme in my personal planner.



Using Pinterest and Simply Learning's list, I discovered all kinds of materials to use for Tot School. I kept my eyes out for supplies everywhere I went (Dollar Tree has some GREAT stuff and I've been able to find quite a few things, including Do A Dot markers at Home Goods!) I also brought home supplies from my classroom (all bought with my own money years ago!) I bought this Sterilite three drawer to keep my materials organized.



Each night, I plan on pulling the materials I will need and put them in these three bins. The teal bin will be S's sensory bin, the yellow bin will house any thematic books and materials, and the blue bin will be a catch all.



I'm planning on doing a weekly recap to share what we did and also just for memory's sake. I'm hoping it will keep S entertained and help our summer be fun! Don't worry, there's going to be plenty of unstructured play, pool time, play dates and Gymboree in there too! Keep an eye for my next post where I'll share our schedule. 

I hope you follow me along this fun journey!