September Lesson Plans

In preparation for Ashley eventually having another baby for me to take care of, I decided that next week Lily and Tristan will be going ‘back to school’! I also need to start preparing myself for longer days spent inside once it starts to get colder and we can’t spend a majority of the day outside. The two of them are already on a pretty good schedule, but I would like to add a little more structure, as well as throwing in some sneaky learning tactics. I based my lesson plan model of ones I had to create when I worked for The Learning Experience. For the lessons, I used a combination of things I did with my class, things I found on Pinterest, projects my mom used when she taught, and things I did myself as a child. Each day will include an art or sensory project, a fine motor skill to master, time with music and movement, and a language activity. In addition, each week will have its own focus skill. For example, the first week we will be practicing putting on our own shoes. It could also be a task as simple as making a tower from blocks. Each week will start with introducing a letter and a color and a book that will be the theme for the week. I would like to teach them (and myself) to sign each color and letter as well. When we run out of colors, we will reconnect with our shapes. I am excited to do an array of fine motor and sensory activities with them, especially now that they are older and can handle more activities on their own.

Here’s an example of the lesson model, the projects I plan to do, and the skills we plan to work on. We’re starting off simple and hopefully we’ll all be able to ease into this (slightly) new routine. I am hoping to update this on a daily (more likely weekly) basis and compare what I wanted to get done vs. what we actually got done. I am a realist, so there will be days where certain tasks will not be completed, and that’s fine too. I am very excited to get back into a good groove and watch them learn new tricks!

Week One: September 1-5

Book of the Week: Alligator Alphabet by Stella Blackstone and Stephanie Bauer

Letter of the Week: A

Color of the Week: Red

Monday September 1: OFF

Tuesday September 2

Art & Sensory: Painting the Letter A with water colors

Fine Motor: Using a skinny paint brush

Language: Reading “Alligator Alphabet” and talking about letters

Music & Movement: Dancing to Bop Til You Drop

Focus Skill: Putting our shoes on by ourselves

Wednesday September 3

Art & Sensory: Gluing red tissue paper onto an apple

Fine Motor: Pincher grasp while gluing the tissue paper

Language: Talking about the Letter A and things that begin with it

Music & Movement: “Kids in Action”

Focus Skill: Putting our shoes on by ourselves

Thursday September 4

Art & Sensory: Gluing dyed rice to the Letter A

Fine Motor: Pincher grasp to pick up rice

Language: Talking about things that start with A

Music & Movement: Going on a hunt around the house for things that are red

Focus Skill: Putting our shoes on by ourselves

Friday Septmeber 5

Art & Sensory: Apple stamping pictures of things that are red

Fine Motor: Using an apple as a stamp

Language: Talking about things that are red

Music & Movement: “Exercise Song”

Focus Skill: Putting our shoes on by ourselves

Summer Activities and Upcycled Jar Project #2!

Summer is officially here! Time to break out the baby pool, lather on the sunscreen, and sweat your buns off while coming up with new and exciting ways to entertain your kids! 

We have been trying to get outside in the morning when it’s cooler and the patio is shaded for some bubbles, sidewalk chalk, and sensory time. The afternoons have been pretty hot and once they start to get sweaty, they also tend to get a little cranky. The easiest way to get them inside at that point is straight bribery with popsicles and ‘special treats’. I have been pinning new and fun craft ideas and this weekend I need to sit down and put together some ideas for the upcoming weeks (and also plan Lily’s 2^nd birthday…eek)!

I found a recipe for cloud dough and decided to give it a whirl this week. The recipe calls for 8 cups of flour for every cup of (baby) oil. Simple, easy and fairly cheap. I opted to use baby oil because it smells better than cooking oil and makes our hands soft. I made a big production out of mixing the flour and oil together and the kids had a blast stirring and stirring and stirring. Then I separated the dough into two Tupperware containers, gave the kids some small spoons, shovels, and other little cups to scoop the dough into and let them go wild. They were very cautious on day one. They barely got any on their hands, while I was wrist deep trying to mold shapes. It doesn’t leave as big of a mess as you would imagine and you can simply dust it off. The second day of playing with it, Lily used her hands a little more but Tristan stuck to utensils only. It was a fun and new sensory activity that I am sure I will be using a lot of this summer. I want to invest in a small sand table and possibly fill it with cloud dough for a period of time. Gotta add that to Lily’s birthday list!

I recently posted one way to upcycle pickle and salsa jars, and I came up with another fun idea. I have been saving the lids to the food pouches (or squeezes as we call them) for quite some time because once a preschool teacher garbage hoarder, always a preschool teacher garbage hoarder! I finally decided to use some to make a sorting game for the kids to play with and practice matching, colors, and fine motor. I took the labels off as best as I could and then covered the outside of the jar with construction paper. We are in week two of our colors and just learned orange so I opted for an orange jar, a red jar (last week’s color), and a green jar (I have A LOT of green lids). I took a picture of a group of each color lid and taped that to the label as well. We started by just identifying the color of the orange jar and all the orange lids inside and practiced putting the lids into the jar. Then I introduced the red and green jars and dumped the lids into the pile. I showed them the objective of the ‘game’ and tried to block off the jar when they put in the wrong color. That cracked them up and caused them to start throwing the lids everywhere. Yikes. After we calmed down and regrouped, I dumped the jars again and just watched them play. It’ll be interesting to see them learn how to sort and match over the course of the summer. And once we eat some more pickles and/or salsa, I’ll introduce another color!

Happy Summer!!