School Ideas for almost 3yo

On Sun, 22 Feb 2004 17:41:07 EST, Daye wrote:

Hello all...

DH started back to Uni today. I am also doing a short business course
for the next 5 weeks. With both DH and I back at school, DD is really
excited by the idea of school.

On the way home from taking DH to the train, the idea of DD having
school at home. DD will be 3 in June. I will be her teacher. I want
to introduce her to the idea of school, while making it fun to learn.

It might be fun for your daughter and illuminating for you to give her
a turn being the teacher, with you and the stuffed animals being the
students.

Louise

"Daye" wrote in message
...

On the way home from taking DH to the train, the idea of DD having
school at home. DD will be 3 in June. I will be her teacher. I want
to introduce her to the idea of school, while making it fun to learn.

The areas I thought we would cover is letters, numbers, colors and
animals, to start off with. I will be making some worksheets, as well
as downloading some off the net. She doesn't know how to write yet,
but I thought I would let her have a scribble and try to make the
letters and numbers. For colors and animals, I thought I could do
some coloring pages. If this goes well, it would lean us more heavily
towards homeschooling (which I really want to do).

If I were going to try to create preschool-at-home, I'd set up a new and
special place as our "school place." I'd put the new materials (coloring
books, playdoh, puzzles, ...) there and plan to go there on some regular
basis, maybe for 30 minutes after breakfast every day to "do school."

In preschools, they always have a letter of the week, sometimes a number of
the week; they often have a little figure of some sort (felt?) with various
types of clothes, and every day the kids help dress that person
appropriately, giving them the opportunity to learn about the seasons and
the weather. They always have hooks with the child's name on it, so the
child starts recognizing that name. Preschools tend to go nuts over every
holiday, with special craft projects, learning the songs of the holiday,
etc. They are heavy on consistency and structu we always do it this way,
and then we do this this way, and etc. They also often punctuate the week
with "music day" and "library day" and the like.

You could recreate all of this at home, even with a 3 YO -- just don't have
unrealistic expectations. I think the goal is more "exposure" than anything
else. Most kids go to preschool for 2 or 3 years, and they encounter the
same stuff, pretty much, over and over and over and eventually it sinks in.
Learning stuff in preschool isn't like learning stuff in 3rd grade, when
they present material, practice it with you, make you practice it some more,
then expect you to remember it.

But let me caution you that IME and IMO, the fun part of "school" for 2 and
3 YOs is the stuff that only comes with "real" school: having teachers who
aren't us and who therefore do things and say things differently than us and
treat them slightly more formally than we do; meeting the other kids and
making buddies; learning the rules, like where you hang your backpack, how
to line up, being a "line leader," etc. (yes, I think most kids that age
find this kind of thing very exciting).

I'm not sure how well you could generate that kind of excitement -- the
excitement of the new -- in your home. Kids aren't dumb. Your DD knows that
you and her dad go *off* to school; you don't just go "over there" to your
desk.

But, hey, maybe I'm wrong. Setting up a little school and dressing the
little person and doing the letter of the day and all that actually sounds
pretty fun. Nevertheless, I personally suspect that, pretty soon, your DD
will start to say, "Not today, Mom," and you'll be forced to decide how
important it is to you to create preschool-at-home. That is, is "going to
preschool" (at home) her choice, or not?

Let me suggest, anyway, that she doesn't need to do "preschool-at-home" to
learn all the stuff that kids are expected to learn before they hit "school
age" (seasons, letters, numbers, holidays, etc.). I value learning,
including "book learning," very highly, but I personally sent my kids to
preschool for fun and so I could get some work done or spend time with their
siblings. Simply by "mothering her": reading books, singing, taking her out
and about and talking to her while you do everything you do, she will learn
her ABCs, her numbers, her seasons, her months, her address, etc.

As far as homeschooling a young school-age child (5 and up) : I think the
beauty of it is that it is NOT school. While "preschool-at-home" sounds like
it could be a hoot, if only for a while, the idea of "school-at-home" (in
the early grades) does not sound fun or worthwhile to me (unless your reason
for homeschooling is that you object to the mainstream culture and want to
keep your kids away from it). I homeschooled my son for 1st and 2nd grades
(that's 6-7 and 7-8 years old here), and we did very little "desk work." He
had to do handwriting and math from a textbook most days, and I occasionally
made him write a book review or answer questions about a subject he'd been
reading up on, but life was his classroom (sorry if that sounds silly; it is
true!). He drew, rode his bike, wrote stories, made and lost some friends,
wrote an encylopedia of rock n' roll, read a small library's worth of kids'
literature of his choosing, explored under the rocks, read armfuls of books
on his current obsession whatever that might be, went to museums, made a
movie, looked up projects to do on the web, recorded an "album" of original
songs, blah blah blah.

Anyone have ideas about what else to cover or how to cover these
subjects? Books and website recommends would also be very
appreciated.

For future reference, the book "The Well-Trained Mind" offers plans for a
classical education at home. I never wanted to get that formal, but it
sounded like a great education to me. A few educational websites:
funbrain.com (games for kids), edhelper.com (for parents: spelling lists,
grade-level skill lists, etc.), brainpop.com (*great* educational movies on
lots and lots of topics, but mostly geared for older kids than yours, say, 6
to 12). Good luck!