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Preschool Weekly Activity Schedule (13) – All About Me

Thursday, September 2nd, 2010

Formerly known as “Toddler Activities Schedule,” the Preschool Weekly Activity Schedule is designed to help parents and caretakers of toddlers and preschoolers do one easy – but enriching – activity with their children each day of the week.

Each week features fun and educational activities; book, music, and sign language suggestions; and other ideas to help adults and children connect through learning and fun. Please check out the archives for other themes and activities.

This week’s topic is “All About Me,” one of your child’s favorite subjects.

Sunday – Messy Play

*Fingerprint Art: Use paint to make cute fingerprint characters.

Monday – Exploring Our World

*The Differences Among Us: Celebrate the differences that make us all unique! Take a few old magazines and cut out pictures of people – find different ages, ethnicities, etc. Make a collage with your child, and talk about how the people are the same and different. PBS has a few more ideas to celebrate diversity.¹

Tuesday – Pretend Play

*Photo Shoot/Dress Up: Get the camera ready, your little one is going to be a model. First, ask them to make all kinds of faces – happy, sad, angry, surprised, take a picture of every face and see if she can label them later. Then, play dress up and take pictures of your child in different costumes. You could also talk about different jobs people have using the different dress-up clothes.

Wednesday – Science Adventures

*My Fingerprints (Child Identification Kit): this activity will not only serve as our science adventure for the week, it’s also an important one for every parent to do for safety’s sake: we’re going to create identification kits for our kids. There is a free kit available from Project Jason, it is in PDF format and ready to print. While the chances of your child being abducted are slim to none, this kit can give you a little peace of mind.

For the fingerprint portion, you’ll just need an ink pad. Talk to your little one about how everyone has a unique fingerprint, that our fingerprints help us pick things up, and that we leave our fingerprints whenever we touch something. It is also fun to look at them through magnifying glasses.

Thursday – Language/Pre-Reading

*Write a Biography: Write a story about your little one, and let her help you fill in the details. Include details like where she lives, who is in her family, what her favorite food is, etc.

Friday – Fun with Numbers

*Measure Me: Using string, measure your child’s height and talk about how many inches/feet he is. If he is interested, help him measure other body parts and things around the house too.

Saturday – Weekly Yoga Pose

*Calming Body Breath Meditation: This parent-guided meditation will help your child learn how to focus and relax. Visit Be Present Mama for full details of the meditation, but here is a snippet:

Take your child’s foot into your hand and say , “Let’s close our eyes. Now picture your feet in your head and think about how they feel. Take a deep breath as you picture your feet and relax. Breathe into your ankles, allowing them to be soft and relax. And now your lower legs…” As you talk about each body part, touch that part to help your child bring his focus there.

Book and Music Suggestions

*Hokey Pokey: Sing the Hokey Pokey and shake out different body parts
*Whoever You Are, by Mem Fox – beautifully illustrated!
*About Me songs and rhymes at Everything Preschool
*A collection of books “about me“

And for my fellow middle class white parents, yes – it is healthy to talk about race. ↩

Posted in Activities for Toddlers, Arts & Crafts, Creative/Dramatic Play, Educational, Fun & Games, Music, Toddler Activity Schedule | 2 Comments »

Gentle Parenting Ideas: Traveling with Toddlers

Monday, August 30th, 2010

This post is the sixth in a series about gentle parenting through potential power struggles with your toddler. Each post will give you ideas and examples for using love and logic to work through some fairly common parent/toddler areas of concern: brushing teeth, getting into the car seat, meals/eating, shopping, diaper changes, picking up toys, and traveling. I welcome your gentle/respectful parenting ideas and feedback; thank you to everyone who has already contributed ideas.

Ideas to Make Traveling with Toddlers a Positive Experience

Storytelling: Take turns telling getting creative with your toddler by telling stories. Trust me, your stories don’t need to be bestsellers to keep your child’s attention.

Audio Books: When you get tired of spinning your own yarns, let someone else do it for you. Check out audio books from your local library and listen to them together.

Sing: Whether you are singing alone, with your toddler, or with the radio or a CD, make music! They Might Be Giants have some fun kids’ songs that are also easy on adult ears.

Occupy their Hands: Bring along a simple activity that will require their concentration and some dexterity. Tie some loose knots in a piece of smooth rope and ask your toddler to untie the knots. Try a nuts and bolts toy (we own and enjoy this nice wooden version from Plan Toys, but as long as you are supervising you could try the real things). Bring lacing cards (here are some cute dinosaur ones; we got primary color shape lacing cards cheap from US Toy). Buy some stickers and let them stick them on the in-flight magazine or some old paper from home.

Check Out the Scenery: Don’t let the world pass you by without talking about it. Remember that every new experience builds new pathways in your little one’s brain – help make the traveling experience rich by talking about what you see outside of your window. If you can, try taking pictures of it to revisit with your toddler later, you might be surprised by how much she remembers.

Take Funny Pictures: Let your toddler get into the memory making mood by both taking funny pictures of him (at roadside attractions, in his car seat), and by letting him take pictures too. You can create a memory book later if you are so inclined.

Snacks: Don’t forget that your little one will want some healthy calories at regular intervals. Keep an assortment of portable snacks ready.

Bring Non-Toys: Most toddlers can amuse themselves for at least 15 minutes with a simple roll of blue painter’s tape or a pad of Post-it notes. What other non-toy objects might your little one be interested in?

Play Games: Play “I Spy” or the Alphabet Game (find each letter of the alphabet on signs, etc.). Make up a picture bingo game – make cards with pictures of horses, buses, stop signs, etc. and see how many your child can find.

Something New: Kids might get tired of crayons at home, but there is something magical about a new box. Bring small new toys along and open one on each travel day (or one every few hours). New stickers, new books, etc.

Light Them Up: Traveling at night? Invest a few dollars in glow in the dark bracelets, necklaces, fans, or other toys. Nothing says fun in a dark car like glowing neon chemicals! We got ours from the dollar aisle of Target, you can also find them cheap at Dollar Stores and on Amazon.

Travel-Friendly Toys: Most parents agree that toys like Etch-a-Sketch, ViewFinder, Finger/Hand Puppets, interactive books (I Spy, lift the flap)

Magnetic Puzzles/Stories: Create your own magnets using photographs or card stock. Cut them up into puzzles or let your toddler use them to make stories. (There are some more great make-your-own ideas on that link!)

Portable Activity Bags: What can you do with some pieces of yarn and a square of sandpaper? Create art! That idea and many more are on The Sunny Patch’s Activity Bags for Preschoolers page (not all travel friendly).

Take Frequent Breaks: Please don’t expect your toddler to sit for hours on end – they are used to being much more active and on the move. Plan frequent pit stops into your drive time, or let them get up and wander when possible if you’re on a plane or train. You may also want to try to schedule travel around your child’s normal nap schedule (although this may not work for some kids).

What ideas do you have to help make traveling a good experience? Please share them in the comments.

http://thesunnypatch.blogspot.com/2007/09/activity-bags-for-preschoolers.html

Posted in Activities for Toddlers, Arts & Crafts, Attachment Parenting, Creative/Dramatic Play, Discipline, Educational, Fun & Games, Music, Parenting, Sensory, Toddlerhood | 7 Comments »

Wall Racetrack

Thursday, August 19th, 2010

The heat index has been surpassing the 100 degree mark for awhile here in Kansas City, so unless we are outside in the water, we’re not outside.To interrupt the boredom of being stuck inside for days on end, we created an indoor racetrack for Kieran.

Moving play to a different location has some nice side benefits¹:

*It allows your child to think creatively;

*It invites your child to explore and interact with her playthings in novel ways;

*A change of scenery may facilitate new learning opportunities. For example, in the short time Kieran has been playing with his wall racetrack, we’ve already had a discussion about gravity, after he commented on the fact that the cars do not stay on the track unless he is holding them.

*In the case of the wall racetrack, it is a great way to utilize a small play area – you build the play space up instead of out.

Here’s how we created our wall racetrack:

1) Get a big piece of paper: we have a roll of butcher paper that is perfect.

2) Draw your tracks: we laid wooden railroad tracks down in a fun shape that fit our paper and traced them with pencil.

3) Pretty it up: we traced over our tracks with marker, added yellow lines in the middle, drew a checked start/finish line, and added a sign that says “Welcome to Kieran’s Speedway.”

4) Attach it to the wall: we used tape.

Have you been dealing with too much time inside? How do you chase away the boredom that comes with the summer heat?

This is true even if you are simply taking toys that are normally played with indoors, out. Childhood 101 had an excellent post on this for our June Carnival of Natural Parenting. ↩

Posted in Activities for Toddlers, Creative/Dramatic Play, Educational, Fun & Games | 10 Comments »

Hiking Fun

Thursday, July 29th, 2010

Do you hike with your little ones? I’m guest posting today over at Breastfeeding Moms Unite! about five ideas to make hiking more fun for you and your toddler or preschooler.

Please stop by Melodie’s site and leave your own ideas for hiking fun!

When you’re done there, be sure to check out Melodie’s guest post that I hosted here last week – she wrote about identifying local flowers and plants when you are out and about with your kids.

Posted in Activities for Toddlers, Educational, Fun & Games, Sensory | No Comments »

Gentle Parenting Ideas: Toddlers and Picking Up Toys

Tuesday, July 27th, 2010

This post is the fifth in a series about gentle parenting through potential power struggles with your toddler. Each post will give you ideas and examples for using love and logic to work through some fairly common parent/toddler areas of concern: brushing teeth, getting into the car seat, meals/eating, shopping, diaper changes, and picking up toys. I welcome your gentle/respectful parenting ideas and feedback; thank you to everyone who has already contributed ideas.

Ideas to Make Picking Up Toys a Positive Experience

Slam Dunk: Get several baskets to store your toys in. When it’s time to put the toys away, turn it into a slam dunk contest and have everyone see how many toys they can “shoot” into the baskets.

Play “I Spy”: While helping your toddler pick up her toys, turn it into a game of “I Spy” to make it fun (and even educational!). “Let’s see if we can put away something yellow.” “Can you find 4 dishes to put in your play kitchen?” “I spy something round to put away.”

Tip Toe Toys: If you’re not in the mood for noise, see how quietly everyone can clean up. Make it a game of tip toeing around the room to see who can clean the quietest.

Musical Cleaning: Find a music source and get ready for some giggles! Tell your kids that any time the music is on, they should see who can put the most toys back in their places. Once the music is turned off, they have to freeze.

Organize: It’s easier to pick up when everything has a place. Try separating toys out into bins – blocks in one, dolls in another, etc. It will be easier and faster to pick up (and find toys the next time) if they are organized neatly. Let your kids help organize by drawing (or cutting out from magazines) pictures to tape on the bins or decorating the labels.

Play Pretend: It’s no fun to clean up when you’re a child, but what about when you’re a dog? How do dogs clean up? (By picking things up with their mouths, of course!) What if you were a robot? A crane? A garbage truck? Pretend with your child that you are different animals and machines, and see how each one would pick up toys.

Consider Your Toddler’s Feelings: If you interrupt the construction of a masterpiece of blocks, you will probably not get your toddler’s cooperation. If your toddler has been playing so long that he missed snack time and has low blood sugar, he will probably not be in the mood to help clean. If he is overtired, he will probably do much more whining than cleaning. Try to look at what you are asking from your toddler’s perspective. Don’t expect more than what is age appropriate, and always remember that he’ll be more willing to help if you are doing the same thing.

A Little at a Time: Rather than saving clean up for when the play area is a total wreck, have “ten minute tidy times” throughout the day. Encourage children to help you clean up one activity before moving on to the next. It’s easier to clean small piles than it is to tackle total chaos.

Act It Out: Make up a story or a song about cleaning. Many parents like the “clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere; clean up, clean up, everybody do your share.” Or pretend like you are both the little engine that could, saying “I think I can” every time you pick up a toy.

Use a Timer: Try setting a timer for a few minutes and see if everyone can clean up the toys before the time goes off.

Combine Cleaning with Something Fun: If you don’t mind snacks in the play area (and you have some that aren’t messy), try combining snack time with clean-up time. Or debut new CD’s during clean-up time, and encourage everyone to dance around while cleaning.

What ideas do you have to help make cleaning up a good experience? Please share them in the comments.

Posted in Activities for Toddlers, Consensual Living, Creative/Dramatic Play, Discipline, Educational, Fun & Games, Parenting, Toddlerhood | 8 Comments »