Preschool is a magical time before children need to be reading or worrying about tests and I can’t wait to share this time with my daughter. I can simultaneously focus on teaching her early academic skills and we can have fun exploring and being creative. She still has a strong need for movement and that will be incorporated into our preschool.
Seasonal Preschool Plan
Unlike my math curriculum, I am not creating a curriculum from scratch for our main preschool curriculum. I am using Preschool Play: Seasons of Wonder Coursebook | Oak Meadow as the backbone for our preschool. This curriculum is packed with stories, verses, songs, games, activities, baking, and art. It is organized monthly, but it is left up to parents how to use the material within any given month. I will share how we are using this curriculum monthly. The stories provided each month are engaging for children and wonderful for inquisitive little minds. The songs and verses are well thought out, and motions are provided with many of them.
Join Us for a Free Preschool Math Curriculum – hummingbirdhomelife.com
Free September Preschool Math Curriculum – hummingbirdhomelife.com
Along with this main curriculum, I am supplementing our experience with 7 other preschool resources, as well as a number of picture books. Most of these I am borrowing from our local library. The exception is the three nature craft books I will be using. All three books are out of print and since I am using them sparingly, I will provide the full details of what we are doing from those books as part of the curriculum. That leaves 4 other preschool resources.
Additional Preschool Resources We are Using
The first preschool resource we will be using is Preschool Art: It’s the Process, Not the Product! (As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.). If you really enjoy art projects with your child, I highly recommend buying this book. It breaks down all the projects within it in a simple chart that tells you how complicated the project is and what ages it is best for. The instructions are well written and easy to follow with clear pictures. It also focuses on the process of creating art, rather than the outcomes. There are no cutesy handprint turkeys in this book made more by the parent than the child. Those might be fun for parents to look at, but they don’t engage preschoolers in learning.
The second preschool resource we will be using is 101 Movement Games for Children: Fun and Learning with Playful Moving (As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases). If you have a child that loves to move, climb and has way too much energy like I do, I highly suggest this book, especially for the winter months. I will be pulling games from this book monthly for our game days to keep my own child moving.
Auditory Preschool Resources
The third resource we will be using is A Day Full of Song: Companion CD (As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases). If you are interested in Waldorf teaching, or plan to follow the Waldorf teaching philosophy, this would be a great CD to buy. I will be using about 6 songs from this CD as part of our preschool curriculum starting in October. My daughter also loves listening to music and picking out which CD or tape (yes tape!) to listen to.
The fourth preschool resource we are using is Nursery Rhymes with CD (As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases). This is a textured book with a CD included. This is a wonderful book for children with sensory needs, but all children will benefit from the 22 nursery rhymes. We will be using about 12 of the nursery rhymes in our preschool curriculum starting in December. We will be reading the nursery rhymes, listening to them and learning them together. Nursery rhymes are invaluable for developing pre-reading awareness through developing phonological patterns.
Our Seasonal Preschool Plan
With these preschool resources, a full 36-week preschool curriculum is created. Every week there will be a core story to read and bring to life through our twice weekly circle times. Circle times will also have songs, verses, and finger plays. Some of these will be done sitting, while others will involve moving our whole bodies. Circle time will focus on seasonal changes for nature science, story comprehension and rhyming for pre-reading skills, motions and finger plays for fine motor development and dancing for gross motor development.
Once a week there will be a game day to inspire my preschooler to move her body. These games will focus on executive functioning skills, like learning how to follow instructions, as well as fine and gross motor skills. Most of the games will be simple games with plenty of repetition her little brain and body.
Once a week we will have fun with an art project, nature craft, or baking activity. These will focus on seasonal changes and spending intentional time with my child. The development of the creative side of my child is just as important as academics.
The Nitty Gritty
Each of these four days will take up about 30 minutes depending on how often my child wants to repeat the songs and games. We may also find ourselves reading the picture books multiple times over the course of a week, or playing some of the games my child loves outside of game day. Activity days will need some preparation and clean up, as will occasionally a circle time, especially if we will be using a felt board. The supplies will be kept as simple as possible and most of them I probably already have. I will share what we are doing each month.
Happy singing!
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