Birthday Week Preschool Activities

I can't believe I am just now getting to Archer's birthday post! His birthday was mid May! I blame the basement renovation! Anyway, since we had a houseguest, Xander was almost done with school and the weather was finally beautiful, we went pretty light on the school work.

Playdough was the biggest hit of the week! I got out some silicone cupcake liners, number candles and googly eyes. Archer made cupcakes and monsters multiple times.

More play dough with his resin numbers. These were perfect since I used confetti sprinkles in them.

We did all of the pages from his Birthday Cuisenaire Printables

I found this adorable ice cream number sorting activity from TPT. It was perfect for my little guy who LOVES all things numbers. To make it easier, we did divide them into 1-10 and 11-20. Otherwise, it took up too much space for him to see all the cones well.

Cloud dough (flour and baby oil) with some cupcake liners, a scoop and his resin numbers.

These were some of the birthday themed books on his shelf.

Reading If You Give a Pig a Party made him want to read all of our Laura Numeroff books

Birthday cake dot to dot.

He found these giant playing cards and spent days organizing them (and just carrying them around). However, he hates the face cards and refuses to keep them in the deck.

Playing with pattern play blocks.

His big birthday gift from us this year was a boat and canal set from AquaPlay. I like it a lot, but it really does need a level surface.

Making shapes with geometry building set

Nice weather meant we got to blow up the kiddie pool!

Archer found his base ten blocks, so wanted to build several numbers.

Light table play

Historically, Archer has not been one to color. Luckily, he has been much more into using crayons lately. He mostly uses them to write numbers and draw lines and shapes.

Letter U - Urchin Week

These are our homeschool preschool activities for the Letter U and Urchin week. Archer was 35 months. You can see our full "curriculum" post here, but we will only use some activities each week. The majority of his time is still unstructured play. 

This was his shelf setup above his desk. I hung some bulletin board letters, a sign language card (from And Next Comes L) and his work from the week. The shelf had an Alphabet Reader, a Meet the Phonics Letter Reader, a peg letter and a wooden letter train car. 

Cut and Paste Phonics Hunt. He likes doing it with the paper cutter.

Letter construction (From Tired Need Sleep)

Dot letters from (Confessions of a Homeschoolers)

There were his shelves for the week. I used Magnatiles to make a U on his white board and added some magnetic letters and fridge phonics. On top I have his Alphabet Soup Can and his preschool basket.

Shelves on the left had a some ocean life vocabulary cards, some rhyming puzzles, Magna-Qubix and some Daniel Tiger play figurines. Shelves on the right had some a boat puzzle, a Water Wow Sea pad, Geometric Solids, a bead activity, some lacing animals and a basket of vehicles.

Using kinetic sand with our Geometric Solids

Playdough with design rollers.

This beginning maze book has been so well loved by both kids it no longer completely erases. I don't think Archer would let me throw it away, though.

Putting pony beads on the suction cups of shower clings.

Ordering numbers with Conezilla.

This kid loves putting numbers on his number board.

Chameleon Bean Bag Toss

Ocean Life Vocabulary Cards

Sea creature lacing

 

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Find other Ocean Resources here:

How To Encourage Your Child To Be A Creative Thinker

 Creativity is a skill, which parents can encourage in their children. You might think of creativity as an inborn talent, but there are ways to teach it too. Creativity is not just limited to being musical or artistic. Creative thinking is essential for math, science, social intelligence, and more. Here are some easy ways to encourage your child to be a creative thinker. 

Image - free for commercial use

Encourage Questions

One of the best ways to encourage a child to think creatively is to encourage them to wonder about things. Ask your child questions when you’re doing things together, like asking why they think the sky is blue, or how they think gravity works. They don’t need to get the answer right, but thinking about it will develop their ability to think creatively. You can explain the right answer to them afterwards, helping them to be curious about the world around them. This can enhance their imagination and problem-solving skills. 

Help Them Express Their Intelligence

There are different kinds of intelligence. These different skills can be developed over time, even if your child doesn’t initially show signs of them. Sometimes it can be hard to recognize what a child is naturally inclined towards a certain kind of intelligence. To find out, give your child lots of opportunities to express all different kinds of intelligence, through play, worksheets, and puzzles, so you can see what they do best. You can get started with these 3rd Grade Lesson Plans. 

Teach Them Problem Solving

Whether it’s a difficult homework question or an emotional problem, you should help your child to understand there are always multiple ways to come at a problem to solve it. Teach them that their different perspectives on everything. Help them to see all sides of a problem and the different ways to solve it. 

Capture Their Curiosity

Children are naturally curious and always want to learn about things. Find ways to push their curiosity in the right direction. For example, expose to them your local culture through art and literature, and talk to them about what they read and see means. Talk about nature, what’s on the news, or about things that are happening in the lives of their friends. Find age-appropriate ways to discuss important topics, like the environment. Meaningful discussion can get their curiosity going. 

Encourage Reading For Pleasure

Limit the screen time of your children, whether TV, computers, phones, or tablets. Doing this give your children more time for more creative hobbies, like reading, which will encourage creativity. Reading for pleasure is a great way to help your child understand the world and express themselves better. It develops their logical thinking skills and can focus them on learning new things if something captures their interests. Take them to the library and let them pick out books. Talk to them about the books they like and why. This can give you an insight into the way your child thinks and what appeals to them when they read. 

This blog post was sponsored by FatJoe

Birthday Cuisenaire Templates

While we haven't started a formal math curriculum yet, I have been trying to periodically use Cuisenaire Rods. Since we're still in the exploration/familiarization stage with the rods (and probably will be for months, until he's ready for more), template matching activities seem to work well for us. He enjoys them and they let us have conversations about the rods and how they compare to one another. He also enjoyed the element of counting up each color of rod at the end. Since it is almost his third birthday, I made some birthday templates for him.

Print the Birthday Cuisenaire Templates HERE

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Letter T - Tiger Week

These are our homeschool preschool activities for the Letter T and Tiger week. Archer was 35 months. You can see our full "curriculum" post here, but we will only use some activities each week. The majority of his time is still unstructured play. 

This was his shelf setup above his desk. I hung some bulletin board letters, a sign language card (from And Next Comes L) and his work from the week. The shelf had an Alphabet Reader, a Meet the Phonics Letter Reader, a peg letter and a wooden letter train car. 

Building a T with Cuisenaire Rods (template here)

Dot letters from (Confessions of a Homeschoolers)

Tracing sand paper letters and then writing them himself.  (DIY tutorial here)

Magnetic Pattern blocks on his easel. (Template from Confessions of a Homeschooler)

Playdough with a letter stamper (similar to these) and see and stamps.

Using stamps to decorate some Ts.

Letter T puzzles.

Letter construction (From Tired Need Sleep)

Lacing some Ts.

Letter maze (free to print here).

Letter clipping (free to print here).

Math with his froggy balance.

Working on a puzzle.

Rhyming puzzles

I got him some fraction magnets. They had numbers on them, so he LOVED them.

Putting numbers in order with Conezilla.

I got out our Mental blox set and Archer really enjoyed matching the cards (he wasn't always ready to answer the questions, mostly just build the structure). Then we got out our Venn Diagram rings to sort the pieces by attributes.

 

See other Alphabet Posts: