Our Homeschool: Pre-K

We are one week into our very first year of home school! My geeky mommy self has been excited for this moment since my oldest son was three months old. If you know me, you'd know that is not an exaggeration at all. It's pathetic, I know! But I own it! My oldest son is almost four, my other son is two and a half, and my baby girl is four months. We are making it work. More than that, it is going great! The structure that it adds to our morning has been wonderful. However it does require a little prep the night before to help the morning go smooth. After I get the kids in bed at 7 pm, I set up our school. I thought I would share the details of what that looks like. 

First I set the table with all of our school things.

In front of me, I have my notebook, our Bibles, and kids gummy vitamins. The vitamins really help get the boys to the table in the morning. Who wouldn't like a couple pieces of "candy" to start the day? The first thing we do every morning after gummy vitamins is pray, read a Bible story, and listen to Alexa read a Psalm.    

After that I let the boys play/ explore their "piles" while I bring breakfast to the table. Max's (3yr old) pile for tomorrow has a dry erase board on which I have written his reading sentences and words (yes he is 3 and already reading!!), as well as a few math problems. Next to that is his 1-100 counting chart. He is working on counting from 1-100. He almost did it yesterday! Atop his counting chart is a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios (useful for showing math problems and keeping hunger away until breakfast is ready). Next to that is a red zipper pouch  (from a learning kit from our library) that contains a little finger puppet... just something fun to keep him occupied in the moments I have to take care of baby girl or little brother. 

In front of Maverick (2 yrs old) is also a dry erase board. His is pretty simple. We are working on recognizing the spelling of his name, reviewing letter sounds and shapes. He also has cheerios and a 1-100 chart so he can look at his numbers while he munches. The red zipper pouch is also from the library learning kit. It contains a few felt leaves (we are doing a unit study this month about Fall). He also has an abacus so we can play with counting and addition/subtraction.

Every evening I prep breakfast. Which means measuring out my coffee into the french press, measuring oatmeal into a pot, and filling the electric kettle full of water. This may seem like a silly thing to do the night before BUT with three kids (ages three and under) everything I do the night before is one less thing I have to do in the morning. All I have to do when we come downstairs is switch on the electric kettle and pour the boiling water into the french press and oatmeal pot and breakfast is served!

Every morning we also play with our learning board. I made it out of a cardboard tri-fold display board. It has a manipulative calendar, weather chart, clock, and other fact cards. We do whatever sparks the boys' interest during the morning. I never push them to do too much. They are only two and three years old. So far all this is just play for them and it's also fun for Mommy. As long as everyone is enjoying themselves we stay at the table as long as we want. It can range anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours!

We also read a few pictures books on a particular topic. This month we are "studying" ancient Egypt, Autumn, and weather. So I display a few fun books. Leaving books standing up like this makes the boys beg to be read to. They also love to look at the pictures on the covers and ask questions.

The boys would be so happy if I read to them all day. Not kidding! Below is the list of books I have read to them the last week. Many of them have had repeat readings. I put asterisks next to our favorites so I can remember which ones to get from the library again. Oh, and these are all library books. The library is keeping our home school costs to basically zero.

And while we are doing all this fun learning there is a sweet four month baby girl hanging out with us. Sometimes I have to nurse her in the midst of things but usually she wakes up before the boys so we can get that out of the way first thing and she is happy to watch her brothers. But one thing I could not do without for her is a pack n play. When the boys leave the table and start rough housing or playing with legos, she needs a safe place to be. It's nice to pop her in there so she can look at her baby gym and have some tummy time protected from their antics.

There you have it! Pre-K in our house is basically a long breakfast with table activities and lots of good quality picture books. After that we play, color, paint, listen to classical music and audio books. We keep the TV off Monday through Friday. Confession: during my husband's paternity leave, we got into a bad habit of letting the boys watch shows every morning as soon as they got up. It was an okay crutch while we adjusted to a new baby but I am so glad this morning learning time has replaced it! We have a zoo membership and love exploring our local parks and library. We also go to a weekly Bible study and MOPS at our church so the boys get playtime with peers and learn to follow instructions from other adults. And mom gets a little break a couple times a week. It's going to be a fun year!