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If you can’t tell already, our Home Preschool has gone at a very slooow pace this summer! I love it though! We are enjoying each other, and most importantly, I am letting my son lead his play and learning time!! This is not to say that I am not intentional about “school” because I am, but I am following his interests much more, which is changing me and my teaching opinions. Forever learning and I love it.

We have been incorporating a lot of Reggio-inspired learning into our home and preschool. We cut down our play room and toys which has helped immensely with sibling relationships and mom’s sanity. We have brought more nature in. We are constantly immersed in mathematics learning through counting and numbering objects. We are discovering shapes in our world. A lot of our learning this summer has been allowing my children’s interests lead their learning, and capitalizing on their excitement by creating learning opportunities (like the nature table for my daughter or the shapes for my son). I plan on continuing this learning and sharing it with your here. You can find out more at these posts:

Now, if we read together, we call the day a success. We read and we play. And we try to fit in the planned stuff too, but if we don’t, I postpone or just forget it, and that’s okay. I especially try to do the morning routine (below!) because John still loves it (surprise!), and it’s a wonderful time of togetherness. Singing, reading, reciting, it is my favorite part of the day! I am adapting and learning alongside my children!

You can see full details of our Preschool Plans here. Below is our schedule, and at the bottom of this post are all of the materials that we use. We don’t use all of the listed materials for every letter, but we rotate around the curriculums and supplements.

{This post contains affiliate links, please see my disclosure policy.}

Our Schedule

1. Music, Movement, Dance Time

In the mornings, we sing songs and dance to fun children’s or Bible music. (I created free printables to our Sing the Word From A to Z and our Play a Little Bible Songs — these I keep in a ring binder.)

2. Bible Time

We try to read our Bible. We are trying to go through only one (the Preschool Hands-On Bible — you can check out my post on this wonderful Bible and how we create a page each day in our Bible Notebook). But, often, the kids will want to read more, so we will pick and choose between our many Bibles (you can check out our Preschool Bible Resources to see the Bibles we love!)

3. Recitation Time

Next, we move through our above chart (here is a similar one). All of the items on it are free (with the exception of our Montessori sandpaper alphabet cards)! Home preschool does not have to mean high cost! We don’t do a Calendar Chart — it would be lost on him — we will probably do one in our next round of ABCs :)

We follow the following sequence for morning time:

What is the letter of the week?
Can you feel the letter? (We feel each sandpaper letter — putting our finger on the big C as you’d write it and the little c as you’d write it.)
What vehicle begins with the letter Cc? (We are using the Zoomin’ Movin’ Alphabet curriculum from Royal Baloo.)
What else begins with the letter Cc? (We are also using the Letter of the Week curriculum from Confessions of a Homeschooler.)
Let’s read our Bible verse together!
What is the color of the week?
Let’s put ___ (green) objects in the basket! May and John, take turns! (Or a color hunt!)
What is the number of the week?
Can you put (1, 2, etc) Legos in the basket? (John runs to get 3 Legos, and places them in a little basket, with the number three inside.)
Can you put the clothespin on the little letter?
Let’s read our little book together!
Let’s count from 1 to 30!
Let’s count by 10s!
Let’s count by 5s!
What month is it?
(We are beginning to sometimes sing the “Month Song” and the “Days of the Week Song” too.)
What is our poem of the month? (We recite a poem from my 24 Monthly Preschool Chants.)
What is our poem of the week? (We recite a poem from my 12 Poems of Robert Louis Stevenson.)
Let’s sing the Alphabet Song!

4. Letter Work Time

This time is devoted to alphabet letter recognition and phonics sounds through various activities, games, and objects from our curriculums. I focus on hands-on learning activities versus “worksheets.” (Cutting, gluing, making the letter with various manipulatives (resources are at the bottom of this post) occasionally coloring.)

We were creating “stations,” that is, putting out about six activities at once, for him to cycle through, which he loved for the last several months, but recently he has not been enthused. Time to change it up! It is about knowing our children and their passions — you can read more at Connecting with my son and how he learns.

5. Craft, Sensory, or Practical Life Time

This time is often done with my younger daughter. We make sure to make our ABC Felt Animal and our Preschool Alphabet page for the week. We also try to do another sensory fun activity and a practical life activity. I am trying to stay very low key about this portion of our Preschool plans. John is not a craft little boy or a messy painty boy, but he does love sensory “clean play” (likes beans or water play) and playdough if I have him on the right day. So we will continue with these and enjoy the summer months.

6. We read books and enjoy one another.

Color of the Week

Going on our Color of the Week color hunt! We marched around looking for green items :)

We’re going on a green hunt,

We’re going to find some green things.

What a beautiful day!

We’re not scared!

Adapted from our beloved book, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt.

And our number 3 work….

Stations

I set these activities up in our normal station routine and he did maybe one. He is not interested any more! I don’t want to force him to “learn” — glue these little Cs on the big C or else!?!? If he prefers to read a book or doodle on his LeapFrog Writer from grandma, then that is what he loves right now. (Check out the Learning Stations at The Measured Mom for some wonderful ideas for this presentation for children.) This has been a wonderful invitation to work and learn for my son and perhaps he’ll warm to it in the future, for now, we’ll do individual activities at the table or on his floor.

All of our curriculum printables are listed at the end of this post.

John did love cutting practice this week. I was so impressed with his creations!! Here are his preschool scissors — these are so helpful in building confidence for little hands!!

He made a number “1”!!

This is very new and wonderful — he has begun coloring pictures (sparked by our I’m Sorry Pictures), and now he is cutting them out! Love this sweet boy <3

Preschool Alphabet Notebook

We are making an alphabet book with uppercase letters. I save these and will put them in a “book” — probably just with three pieces of yarn — for him to remember each letter! We are using printables from The Unlikely Homeschool. This is simple — just decorate your letter with something related to that letter.

C is for Coffee :) May painted this — John didn’t want to or care at all. She is my little painter and she always wants to be involved when she can!

ABC Felt Animal

Our felt animal this week was a C is for Crab! You can check out all of our ABC Felt Animals here.

ABC Preschool Books to Read

I am starting a new collection of Preschool Books to read for each letter. Here is our list for Preschool Books for the Letter C!

Our Chosen Materials & Activities:

Zoomin’ Movin’ Alphabet curriculum from Royal Baloo

Letter of the Week curriculum from Confessions of a Homeschooler

The Preschool Journey by Teaching Mama. There are many wonderful ideas for crafts and activities for each letter in this eBook. We will pick and choose different activities according to my son’s interests.

My First Hands-On Bible: Reading through the Bible with our Preschool Bible Notebook. I adore this Bible and could not recommend it more highly. I devoted a whole post to “why” here.