Sunday, September 26, 2010

Preschool Tot Activities

Sissy: age 3 1/2 and Dash: age 5 1/2 (not their real names),
with occasional Tot School/Preschool Corner appearances by 10 year old Tornado

Our biggest excitement this week was attending Veggie Tales Live! at a (huge) local church. They were giddy before the show began.

And if you're wondering about Dash's "fancy" necklace (made even fancier while worn with his tie-dyed homeschool co-op t-shirt - it's like he's copying my style from 1994), that's an old Lion King necklace I had gotten at Disneyland in...well, 1994. Dash just immediately latched onto it when he saw it and has insisted on wearing it everywhere lately. I love his sincerity.

I think Sissy was the first person to start dancing in the aisles. Many soon followed.

There was no stopping her. She was rockin' out. She was feelin' it. I had this vision of her dancing on tables at a club when she's 20...

And I was actually proud of Dash because he (gasp) was dancing, too. He wasn't too cool or embarrassed.

It was a fun show!

Dash angrily declared in the car, "I didn't have a good time!"
Me: "You didn't?"
"I didn't have a good time because I didn't want to leave!"


On to school/play time...I wrote in my post Friday a little more about Dash's kindergarten homeschool life...here is more about some of his activities but focusing more on Sissy's side of things:

This was her first day (a few weeks ago) attending the homeschool program at a local (fabulous) arts academy. One day a week, she goes to art, music, and ballet back-to-back.

She also goes with me one morning a week to the baby/preschool room while I teach at Dash's homeschool co-op. She thinks of this as going to school, as well, because she gets to play with the other kids and also do little activities.

She wanted me to take a picture of her very special arrangement of toys she worked on. And I also love this picture because of how cute she looks in her panties, with her arms by her sides.

There were a couple of sidewalk chalk days. They enjoyed discovering what a nice effect the wet driveway had on the chalk. It made it almost like paint. I think I'll tell them to take water out with them next time it's dry - or hose down the pavement first.

They did some other painting...

using these finger stampers.

I love it when they come up with activities on their own. (Takes some pressure off of me!) They found these extra pigs I'd printed off accidentally and took it upon themselves to make their own art projects out of them. (That's Dash's glued to the white paper.)

She practiced name recognition (I deleted her name
s.) by using the stamp that my friend Annette from Live, Learn, Love made when Sissy and M were blog swap partners last summer. Here is her post about how to make your own personalized name stamp.

On the outside of the back door, they drew pictures...

using window markers.

Brother Tornado helped Sissy figure out how to play her Spot It! game. (You have to figure out which cards have "things in common.")

We did several workbook pages. She still struggles with her color and shape recognition. I'm afraid she struggles because I think she couldn't care less. I think she'd rather dance on tables.

This is a animal memory game made out of wood tiles. Sissy is matching up the pictures to the corresponding spots on the colored sheet that came with the game.

We had a couple of cooking projects this week. We made chocolate chip cookies one night (but were only able to make half a batch because we only had that much Earth Balance margarine - how sad is that?). We also made two batches of muffins for Papaw's birthday - Banana Oat Walnut and Pumpkin Carrot.

My darling, darling daughter has been giving me headaches lately. She is going through such a whiny/crying phase. She might fall apart over the smallest thing. If we try to discipline her, she comes unglued. She'll throw herself on the floor and kick and scream (and has bumped her head a couple of times doing this lately). She's such a typically pleasant, sweet girl. If things are going her way, you'd want to be with her all day. But if she doesn't understand why she's not getting her way, especially if she's tired, look out.

I know this phase is not unique so if anyone has any ideas on how to get through it (and overcome it!), I'm all ears!

Of course, she had to smile when she realized I was taking her picture.
She doesn't want to disappoint her public.

Tot Schoolpreschool corner

If you get stuck for ideas to teach or even simply occupy your baby, toddler, preschooler, and even kindergartener, check out the fine ladies' links at 1 + 1 + 1=1 and Homeschool Creations.

6 comments:

Lisa @ Our Country Road said...

Veggie Tales live sounds so fun!! My son is into the whining lately, too. Soo annoying! Fun week!

Annette W. said...

I hadn't heard of Veggie Tales Live before, so thank you for sharing! It will be about 1 1/2 hours from us...maybe not worth it, but still...

Annette W. said...

And thanks for the shout-out!

MaDonna Maurer said...

Great post! Loved the comment about dancing...I have one of those kind of girls too. I thought she was never going to learn her colors..but she finally did. As for the tantrums, I can't remember. I just remember that I was tired of always getting onto her about things so I made a card system. Basically, if she chose to do the right thing at the end of the day she got a sticker, then after 10 stickers we get to go on a date...just the two of us. It is simple date, sometimes just to the 7-11 for a slurpee. Actually, we still do this with her because of attitude issues. As for times she chose to do the wrong thing a card came out...first was a warning, then corner for 5 min., etc. But, if she did two right things or I saw her doing something nice or kind..then I'd move the card back up towards the sticker card...if you want a clearer description let me know and I'll email you.

Kelly Polizzi said...

following you now. Wow my daughter would love veggie tales live. She's 3.5 also.

I'm sorry you are going through the whiny stage two. Sometimes I'm at my whits end with all the break downs! But it is comforting to know I am not alone! I just try to remain calm when she is throwing herself on the floor. Calm but firm and I tell her to stay in her room until she is done screaming. That is the worst punishment in her eyes that i can give her lol. So i use what works. It's horrible when does it outside the house though! Good luck.

The Davidson Den said...

Okay. If we thought our boys (Dash and Noah) were alike, we should have been noticing how much our girls are alike. The dancing, the not knowing colors when we think they should, the whining. Yep. Sounds all too familiar. Remind me to tell you the story about how Saylor finally learned her colors. It might actually give you some insight into what's going on with your own daughter. Just in case they're alike in learning styles as well!