How do You Organize for Early Learning?

[EducatingGirly]

Hi there!  I am pretty new to this forum.  My Girly will be two at the end of this month.  Prior to the time she turned one, I was able to work with her on a daily bases doing little activities to build her motor and communication skills.  But since she started walking and having a greater need to move rather than sit and learn it has been hard for me to keep up.  Recently, I have only been reading to her out loud for her nap/bedtime routines.  Otherwise, she has some Montessori style toys and others that are in a similar style that are rotated out on a weekly basis but she seems like she needs more and is capable of learning so much more. 

I am now ready and able to create a better routine that includes more learning activities.  I have made a list of topic areas resourcing Montessori and Trivium learning styles that I would like to work on with my Girly and have started collecting ideas for "lessons / activities" on Pinterest.  But I am lost on the organization and how to have a basic plan for a toddler.  For example, what items to introduce when, how much do I need to prepare to always have something on hand to jump on learning opportunities, what does a "normal" day look like in your house, what do you do for yourself to keep balance between your needs and children's needs, etc.

Some other things you should know:  I am a Stay-at-home Mom!  My husband commutes far for work but is home most evenings and weekends and would like to be involved with the math / science learning.  Our daughter loves the outdoors, animals, and learning to jump with both feet.  Recently, we had major water damage to our home.  It has since been fixed and we are back home, but during our time away from home our Girly watched TV daily and several times a day.  We have now eliminated any TV watching in our home during the week and it will be restricted during the weekends.  The time needs to now be filled with some engaging work/play/activities for her.

So, there you have a part of my story!  How does this wonderful endeavor work in your home?

[Mela Bala]

Hi EducatingGirly and Welcome to the BrillKids forum 
Sounds like you have been doing an aswesome job with your daughter and you are definitely in the right place to learn about early learning activities!  I see that you are concerned about screen time but have you had a chance to download the Little Reader free trial?  The lessons can be as short as 5 minutes or longer if you choose to show added files you can import.  There are ALOT of files on various topics greated by parents on the forum you can download for free. 
I love the search engine on the forum and you can search for activities by key words.  Here are some threads I pulled pertaining to organizing activities.  Personally I just make a list and fit things in when/where I can and whatever we do not get to I try to make it a priority for the next day.  With children this young it is not always easy to stay on track.
http://forum.brillkids.com/general-discussion-b5/too-many-dvds/
http://forum.brillkids.com/general-discussion-b5/how-to-organize-teaching-schedule-during-the-day/
http://forum.brillkids.com/general-discussion-b5/how-do-you-keep-consistent-on-your-program/
You can probably find more

I still never know exactly when to introduce activities so I let my son be the guide if he does not like it I put it away and try a couple weeks later.  Or I try to be innovative and come up with activities to prepare him for that activity.  It is up to you and the time you have available to prepare what you can.  I have spent many late night preparing activities that my son was not ready for but it is a relief to have them ready for when the right time.  A book called Marshmallow Math (highly recommended on this forum) has shown me many ways to incorporate activities with everyday items.  You will soon find early learning opportunities in every corner and drawer of you house that require little to none preparations.  Eg, counting, sorting, matching, colors can be found in a basket of clean laundry.

A normal day in our house is my son asking for various lessons, atleast one trip with a destination, playtime outside, inside and our meals. I spread his structured lessons out throughout the day inbetween everything else so he has become used to the routine and knows what lesson to ask for. 
I have been trying to work out a balance for my needs but it is hard since most of my me time is while he is sleeping and thats when I can prepare and plan for his early learning. His lessons do consist of dvds and programs so his screen time during the week is a little over a hour daily broken up throughout the day.  He does not have any screen time during the weekends.

You are soooo lucky to have a husband who is willing to take on a couple subjects with you.  My husband supports me but I have to give him detailed instructions but lately he has started to come up with his own activities. 
http://forum.brillkids.com/search2/

[mybabyian]

My son is about the same age as your daughter.  He just turned two.  It is difficult to have anything very structured with him without it feeling too forced.  We do most of our structured learning during snacks and I read aloud to him during regular meals.  This way it is a routine and he is receptive because he is also busy eating and not distracted by other things.  I let him chose what he wants to do, but I'll suggest things to him and he often goes along. 

He has toys for learning that we play with through out the day, but, right now anyway, we just do it whenever it seems right.  I think there is so much to teach during everyday interactions.  It is amazing how much they learn without much effort.  For example, we don't sit down for language lessons, but I try to emphasize different concepts to him during our regular interactions.  I have been teaching him things like "so that," because," "just," "just like" by consciously using these terms in my speech and emphasizing them when I do and it is amazing how he begins to understand and use it in his speech too.  He now tells me things like: "Mommy dump this [out] so that Ian can play."  "Ian rides a skateboard just like his cousin Jason."  "Ian is wet because Ian went swimming."  Even though I haven't formally taught him this I know he would not know how to say these things if I weren't consciously emphasizing them throughout the day.  Language development is a top priority for me as I think it will serve him to learn and understand so many more things. 

We do math throughout the day mostly counting and small sum addition and subtraction with everyday items.  It seems like he is learning a lot from this too.  Its a lot of fun to see him learn. 

I actually started a play group where kids come over and we do learning activities.  It is fun for us and he gets some structured learning that way too.  Mostly I think it serves for social development though which is great too.

Anyway, welcome here.  I hope to hear how things go for you!
 

[msocorro]

I´m having more or less the same problem with trying to fit everything in the day... I have 3 kids, (3,5years, 2years, and 10 months) I finally fell that

[Korrale4kq]

I only have one child. Almost 3. And we don't fit a lot of early learning in. I would love to do more. But we have to be realistic.
Mornings we are often booked, we have activities most days of the week. Early Intervention Class, StoryTime, Paydate. Science Museum. Social things mostly that I think are essential.

8-9pm. James wakes early.Earlier  than we want to. He watches Reading Bear, then does a few learning apps. Eats breakfast.

10-12pm We shower, leave the house for about an hour or 2. We comes home and play with daddy before he goes to work. With the colder weather this will also be out outside morning play time. This is when we used to do math time. Montessori activities and crafts.

12:30ish. We eat lunch. And do cleaning and house chores.

1-2pm Then we do the brunt of our work. We read a lot. James reads to me, and I read to him. This is where we obviously cover reading, vocabulary, grammar ect. We do a litle science and social studies reading at this point too.
He then naps for 2-3 hours. Often me too, or I clean.

4-5pm I do tutoring for 30-60 miutes, so James plays independently. He rides his balance bike a lot.  And he plays cars and trains.

5-7pm . We used to go outside and he would work on gross motor skills a lot, kicking balls, nature walks, eating dinner Outside. We would talk a lot about what we see, observing animals, the seasons, growing our garden, collecting rocks....now leaves. As it gets colder we have been moving this time to before lunch.

Instead...
 5pm is our math time. We do 15-30 minutes of math. Then we do structured play one on one. Drawing, cuttng, pasting, sorting, threading beads. Lots of the motor. This is also a therapy time where we work on PRT.

6pm. James and I make dinner. I think it is important that he helps me. And he loves to help.

Then it is more free time. This is flexible. Sometimes James likes to play by himself. Other times he wants to play with me. We play a lot of cars and trains. Sometimes we will do an experiment. Something simple like watching ice melt as we talk abut the changing is state of matter that we were reading about earlier that morning. This is when James does Little Musician. And sometimes leaning apps.
Sometimes during the day we do some really brief flash card sessions also.

8-9pm. Get ready for bed and then more reading time. Same as before nap. Then usually bed at about 9pm.

We don't have a TV, And though James plays apps they are strict educafional apps.

Now... We reinforce a lot of the things that we learn during our reading time throughout the day. We talk about what we read about a lot. Whether is be about Australia, gavity, autumn, or the ancient Egyptians. We also do a lot of math. Just informal stuff. Like when I cut his sandwhich I explain that I am cutting it in half and quarters. We talk about his cup of milk being full, half full or empty. I ask him to get spoons out of the top draw and to put a toy away on the bottom shelf. We talk about how daddy is tall and James is short. Or the sizes of the pumpkins we just got from a nearby farm on the weekend.
We talk a lot in the car. This is where James learnt left and right. Green means go, red means stop. But we also cover other things that we are learning.


Now... This is where the neurotic part comes in. We have "scripts". Not real scripts but we try and focus on a certain thing each week or day. For example we were just learning about matter for science. We read lots of books about it. We played games about it. And we talked a lot about it. I have a white board that I fill with notes. And I try and bring up a lot of those notes. I don't make it sound like a lecture. But we just informally interject things.
I make notes of things that James is struggling to understand. Right now we are working on ordinal numbers. So I use the vocabulary first, second, third fourth........last etc. a lot. Usually within a few days of talking about these things he masters them.

[learnersinbloom]

My twins are 3 now, but when they were younger, we always did a learning activity right after breakfast, while they were still strapped into their high chairs or booster seats.  They always looked forward to their morning activity and could easily concentrate for 30-60 minutes since they were in their chairs and not running around.  I usually stuck to fine-motor-skills work with dot-paint markers, playdough, matching with manipulatives, etc.., but they learned a lot of pre-reading and math skills through this type of play, too.  The other thing I did was always try to work with them in a smaller, closed space like their bedroom, taking out one game/activity at a time so they would have fewer distractions.  Hope that helps!

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