All about Creation, Red, and Circles (25mos)

Starting up again:
Wow!!  It's been a long time since I've posted an update on Jesse's tot school.  While I haven't posted anything here in a while, Jesse and I have been busy learning - I've yet to find an efficient way to put a post up for all to see.  We took a long break over the winter and just started back up last month!

A new path:
Once I decided to start Tot School back up, I decided to go a different route.  I was primarily doing the printables from 1+1+1=1 (which are amazing).  I think he just wasn't ready to do a lot of the matching stuff and therefore was not very interested.  So after doing some searching, I found another amazing program (www.ABCJesusLovesMe.com) that is centered around God and the bible!  Plus it's FREE - gotta love that - with full lesson plans and great ideas for starting points.  I plan on integrating other things into this program as I go along as well.

Alright, so we just finished Week 1 of the 2 year old curriculum and Jesse had a blast (we took longer than a week but who cares)!  I have to say one thing that I'm not too fond of with this new program is that it doesn't really put a large focus on the alphabet, however, Jesse is really good at this and is able to identify many of the letters already.

The Objectives
Bible Theme: God Made the World Around Me
Lesson: Day, Night, Water, Sky (creation days 1-2)
Memory verse: Genesis 1:1
Color: Red
Shape: circle
Number: 1
Letter: A-G

Week 1 Recap:

Happily painting with white tempura paint using a sponge brush and sponge roller.  

This is page 1 of his Creation Book.  He is showing how God created day and night .  

Focusing on red, I decided to whip up some red "paint" for bath time.  I used shaving cream and red food coloring.  I also made some red "sand" using baking soda, water, and red food coloring on another night.  He loved painting everything red and then watching the water turn red.  

Jesse made the attempt to stay within the circle and then wanted to paint over the word "Circle" and the fine print at the bottom

This is page 2 of his Creation Book.  I mixed blue tempura paint, shaving cream, and white glue for the water and then poured some glue at the top where Jesse could glue some cotton balls for the clouds.  He enjoyed layering the blue mixture in thick piles on his paper but wasn't very interested in cotton balls.  He also did NOT want to get his hands in the paint mixture.

Play dough has been the biggest hit this time around.  I pulled out all of my Valentine's Day themed stuff (because it was red) and let him mix and add it all to his "cookie".  I think he spent about 45 minutes happily creating on this morning!

Our duplo tray was a huge hit and quickly became a bath time activity.  I  only included a small handful in a metal bowl and used only red to go with out color of the week  

I found some awesome wooden beads and I thought Jesse could try to thread the pipe cleaners .  I loved that he had his own ideas and decided to put the beads in the container one by one.  He tried to do the lacing card but is still not very interested in it.  Later on, I added some red silk flowers to this tray thinking he could put them in the container but he just wanted to smell them.  

Jesse caught on to this one quickly.  He knew right away to put the smaller red circles on the paper.  The larger foam circles he just didn't know what to do with those.  My intention was that he would match the ones in the tin to the ones on the tray.  He was more interested in turning the tin into a phone.  I tried to put some sorting cups with the foam circles to match the sizes up and he still was not interested.  The foam circles are now moving to the bath tub to become "bath stickers".

I totally rearranged his area by taking a bunch of his stuff and stashing it in our room.  Things are more simple and more organized.  It has made cleaning up much easier for him and he's quickly caught on that everything has a place.  

• The circle printable can be found at  www.itsybitsylearners.com (Learning My Shapes)
• The apple lacing card can be found at http://www.1plus1plus1equals1.com/TotSchoolPrintables.html

Toddler Time - Cornmeal Sensory Bin

(14.5 Months)
(Sensory Motor Skills- Children use their senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch, to guide and integrate their interactions)

I tried my hand at a sensory bin awhile ago.  It wasn't the huge success that I had thought it'd be but my little guy did enjoy it.

We are on a budget, so I knew I couldn't go out and buy a bunch of stuff.  I had to be resourceful and use things that were actually around the house.  We have some Tupperware drawers that weren't really being used so I decided that would be what I placed the sensory stuff in.  We also had 2 boxes of cornmeal and I just could not see us using them both up any time soon!

Jesse hasn't played in sand yet and he also puts everything in his mouth still so I really wanted to create something that if swallowed wouldn't be a big deal.  The cornmeal was perfect for this and I also decided to put some raisins and uncooked rice in the batch as well.  To make it more interesting I threw in a few toys and some measuring spoons.

I knew I didn't have enough cornmeal to fill the bottom of that Tupperware drawer so I had to put the mixture in a smaller container and just used the drawer to try to contain the mess.  

I blocked off the kitchen and let him go at it.  At first he didn't quite know what to do and wasn't really interested.  I ended up giving him the measuring cups and spoons after a few minutes at which point began the real fun!  Soon corn meal was all over him and all over me, but what mattered was he was having fun and getting some practice scooping things up with the spoons!  

I only let him use this a couple times afterwards.  He was pretty much over the activity, as was I!  Next time I think I would leave out the raisins and the rice.  Surprisingly, he never tried to eat any of bin contents!!  

Toddler Time - Mega Blocks

(14.5 Months)

So I know that my son is only 14.5 months, but he is very eager to learn new things and has been catching on to things so quickly!!  I've been doing some research online and found a lot of parents "schooling" their little ones during what has been coined "toddler time".  Toddler Time is simply special time set aside each day to focus on the toddler.  During this focused time, the toddler is exposed to early learning skills through fun play.

I know I try to make every situation a learning situation but today I decided to intentionally set aside some "toddler time" and try to document it and take some notes on the activity.

I started out with something simple: Fine Motor Skills (playing with mega blocks)

I decided to put down a small blanket to define the play space rather than him having legos scattered all throughout the house.  And unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of him during the actual play time.  

I sorted the legos by color and allowed him to play.  My intent was for him to build, stack, or line up the legos.  He wasn't very interested in this however!  He did end up picking up different colored blocks and mixing up the piles.  I've been teaching him the American Sign Language (ASL) signs for the different colors and shapes so I made sure to say the color and perform the sign for the color of the block that he grabbed.  About halfway through our playtime I noticed that he was starting to "sign" the colors as well (I consider it to be kind of like baby talk.  He's not actually doing a sign for a color yet, he's simply moving his hands in the attempt to sign).  He also had fun placing blocks inside the bag.  I took that opportunity say things like, "that's right, the yellow block is INSIDE the bag" or "there are now 2 blocks inside the bag and the rest of the blocks are OUTSIDE of the bag".  

He did pretty well staying on the blanket and I did have to remind him that the mega blocks needed to stay on the blanket.  I did this by redirecting him towards the blanket if he took a lego somewhere else in the living room.  We ended the activity once I noticed him becoming more interested in his books.