Homeschool Den

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Category: Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities

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Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Ages 2-6: Preschool at Home / Ages 2-6: Toddler/Preschool Activities / Must Read

Preschool at Home: Activities You Can Do with Your 2-4 Year Olds (Fine Motor Skills)

I frequently get questions from parents who wonder just what to do and where to start with their preschoolers.  I thought I would spend a few posts sharing some of the things I’ve done with my kids along the way. Many of the things we did are things most parents do naturally in their home: free play with toys, time exploring and playing outside, dancing to music, reading books aloud...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Homeschool Den / Math: Preschool Math / Must Read

Preschool Math Activities (K4) – Montessori Math and More

It has been ages and ages since I’ve written about ED’s math activities.  A lot of ED’s math happens naturally over the course of the day — counting objects in a picture book, counting by 2s, 5s and 10s when we brush teeth and do dental floss, counting money together, looking at numbers at the store, in books, etc.  Numbers are a part of daily life and we take advantage...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Freebies / Holiday: St. Patrick's Day / Math: Preschool Math / Must Read

St. Patrick’s Day Preschool Math Game

I made these game boards for ED.  It’s a race to 50 (or a race to 100). Print out one game board for each player.  The players take turns rolling the die (use a 20-sided die in the race to 100) and covering the squares on their game board with tokens. The first to cover their entire game board wins the game. You can download these free: St Patricks Day...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Holiday: St. Patrick's Day / Language Arts: Reading / Must Read

St. Patrick’s Day Activities

This activity was a huge hit with ED this past week.  I chose some words from ED’s phonics readers and wrote them out on some shamrocks and taped them on popcycle sticks.  I covered an empty cereal box with construction paper and wrote the words out on the box as well and used a knife to create a slit for the Popsicle sticks. I sat with ED each time she...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Ages 2-6: Preschool for ED - Fall 2011 (age 3 1/2) / Arts and Crafts / Homeschool Den

Easy Sparkly Winter Playdough

We made some play dough together at the beginning of the week and ED has been playing with it every single morning!  Play dough is really easy to make and has a wonderful consistency.   Here’s how we made made ours: 1 cup flour 1/3 cup salt 1 Tablespoon Cream of Tartar (in the spice aisle of your grocery store) 1 Tablespoon oil 1 cup of near boiling water almost...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Human Body Unit / Science: Vertebrates - Invertebrates

Meet Vertebrae-Man — Our Hands-on Explorations of the Backbone and Nervous System!

Continuing on with our vertebrate-invertebrate unit… One day last week we learned a bit about the backbone and nervous system. We talked about the importance and function of the vertebrae and did some activities to explore how/why the vertebrae work. The kids liked this almost as much as they liked Harold (when we did the circulatory system)!  Here’s a picture of vertebrae man–then I’ll explain what we did… I made...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Homeschool Den / Montessori (general info) / Must Read / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Vertebrates - Invertebrates

Invertebrate-Vertebrate Unit Study – Montessori Activities

Homeschooling is so great because you can be flexible and go with the flow when the need arises! We were all prepared to start school with a unit on rocks when my wonderful homeschooling friend offered to give us some flatworms called Planarian. Her family had studied them and their amazing properties.  We jumped at the chance to do something new and delved into a week-long study of invertebrates. It...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Ages 2-6: Theme Time (age 2-4) / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Winter Theme Preschool Unit

Over the break, I wanted to pull together a fun packet for ED with activities she can (mostly) do on her own when I’m working with the other kids.  I settled on a winter-relating unit– snowmen, snowflakes and things like that.  Here are some of the resources I pulled together for her: When I want to find some preschool resources for ED, here are some of the first websites I...

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Ages 2-6: Pete the Cat Unit / Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Freebies / Homeschool Den / Math: Preschool Math / Must Read

Pete the Cat Unit – More Free Resources preK to 1st Grade

ED continued to work on things she selected from her workbox with the Pete the Cat theme. She worked through this addition page I made for her… Buttons Addition  for Pete the Cat Here’s ED doing the activity a couple of days ago: She loved the Pete the Cat Die and graph from Herding Kats. The Pete the Cat Roll and Color is by Shannon over at Kindergarten Hoppenings. ED especially liked...

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Ages 2-6: Pete the Cat Unit / Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Ages 2-6: Theme Time (age 2-4) / Homeschool Den / Math: Preschool Math / Must Read

Pete the Cat Unit

Last week I asked ED what she wanted to learn about. “Kittens!” she declared. I was thinking I would have her make a kitten lapbook, but the more I looked around, the more resources I found for some books called, Pete the Cat. I hadn’t heard of them before, but they seemed to be all the rage among the early elementary teachers who offered many Pete-the-Cat themed worksheets free on...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Freebies / Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Chemistry Unit

Explosion of Colors in Milk Experiment and Other Chemistry Fun!

Isn’t this pretty? This was one of our experiments as we finished up our chemistry unit! One of the chapters in our chemistry book (Real Science 4 Kids-pre-level 1) talked about mixtures. It talked first about how how some mixtures dissolve (like salt in water). Then it went on to talk about soap and soap molecules. We read how soap makes things like butter and grease “dissolve” in water. Detergent...

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Ages 2-6: Fall Theme / Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Holiday: Thanksgiving / Homeschool Den / Math: Preschool Math / Must Read

Fall and Thanksgiving Themed Printable Activities (Free)

Here are a collection of Thanksgiving resources you might want to use with your kids the next few days: ED has really been enjoying dot-to-dots. I thought these printables from Busy Bee Kids Printables were really cute and wanted to mention them if you are interested. Fall and Thanksgiving Dot-to-Dots Color the Turkey: A handwriting activity from Rowdy in Room 300 Cute Turkey Math Game: This is a game I...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Chemistry Unit

More Fun Science Experiments: Watch them Bubble, Bubble Bombs… Acid-Base Reactions

Our chemistry textbook also talked about acid-base reactions.  It explained how antacids can help neutralize the strong acids in your stomach. We contrasted this slow reaction… to the more impressive reaction of baking soda and vinegar! DD was putting her fingers in to see how her stomach would feel. If you haven’t already done Bubble Bombs with your kids, be sure to do that as well! You take a ziploc...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Freebies / Homeschool Den / Language Arts: Reading / Math General Posts / Math: Preschool Math / Must Read

What Has My Preschooler Been Doing Lately?

I thought it was about time to write a post about how my preschooler spends her day. Free, Unstructured Play First of all, she spends a lot of time playing both indoors and out. Play helps kids learn to control their emotions and behavior. Play allows kids to be creative. It helps them learn discipline, resist impulses and develop resiliency. During make-believe play children engage in ‘private speech.’ They talk to...