Memorizing the Moments: Tot-Preschool

Monday, September 2, 2013

Tot-Preschool - Week One

What a week! This was both my first week back at grad school and Xander's first week of his new school program (I discussed the need to change school time to suit his needs better here). I'm not sure if I like the title of Tot-Preschool or not. We are definitely moving on to harder material, even some beyond preschool level. On the other hand, he isn't even three yet. He's definitely still a tot and needs to be doing some tot-like activities (like fine motor and writing skills). I am open to a better name for our school time if you have any suggestions!

Letter Formation/Pre-Writing

Tracing the letters with his write and wipe cards.

Using his Build a Letter Templates and HWWT pieces. First he built the letters on the templates, then he built them by themselves.

Practicing writing in his sand box.

Q-Tip Painting (from 1+1+1=1)

Doing the "A" page from his Printing Fun workbook.

So he has probably outgrown these letter mazes, but he loves doing them, so I went ahead and printed him one for the letter A.

Literacy

Since this was the first week using the Beginner Spelling Cards, I started with the easiest ones. I set out the cards and some letter tiles. I made sure to include all of the letters he needed to complete the cards, and a few others. He LOVED the activity. He was so proud that he changed the words. He had just a little trouble with the "d" and the "r" for drink, but was able to figure it out with some prompting.

Then I gave him "w," "i," "n," and "k" (not in order) and had him make the word "wink" without the card. Once I reminded him that we make words starting at the left and moving to the right (which I did mostly with gestures rather than explaining it to him in those words), he was able to do it.

For extra practice we got out his magnetic letter box and put the cards on his little magnetic lapboard. He thought this was fun too, but I learned I need to consider teaching him alphabetical order! He took forever finding each letter because he didn't understand their relation to one another! I think he'll like it better when he can go faster!

I got out our Very Silly Sentences game. It was the first time I'd introduced Xander to the idea that there are categories of words (noun, verb, etc.). I think I'll wait a while before I hit them harder, but I did like the idea of forming sentences. We started off playing the game the correct way, but it got a little long (for me) so we ended up just using the game cards to make silly sentences. He has asked to play again since.

Math

We did a Right Start Math lesson on his light box. (Seriously, how much fun is that! I love getting to make learning new and exciting for him!). We practiced determining which group has more and using tally sticks to show how many items there are.

I have had this homemade geoboard for a while, but for some reason never shown it to him (I know, bad mommy!). He thought it was a wonderful new toy, even though it was a little challenging! I made a triangle and asked him to make some more triangles. He worked at it for quite a while until he had made a bunch. It also provided a great way to reinforce the shapes in Spanish!

Art

A friend and I recently split a bag of porcupine painters, so this was the first time Xander had used them. He had SO much fun... and made a really big mess! Having a toddler is definitely helping me get over my hatred of making messes!