What do you do with your Toddlers during school?

Such a common question & a huge worry of mine when I had a 2yr old and then a new born. Since then I've had a child every two years or so...Now we're on our sixth child due in November. 

I have an 8yr old & a 6yr old who are officially doing curriculum work for 2nd & 1st grade that we started early in June unofficially doing a little here and there but not every single day. So far we've gotten 36days of schooling in. Monday we start the "official" School year simply because it's labour day & daddy will be home & able to join in on the fun activities we've got planned. We're not doing much more than having fun but it's our official day back to school. Which lead me to think of ways to keep my 4 & 2 year olds learning and busy. Preferably with not much help from me so I can get things done with my two oldest. 

Here's what I've been doing: 

Jojo's totboxes:

I'll give a peek into each box but before I go on I want to give a huge thank you to the mama that put this PDF together. Here's the link...you'll love it. Also I did laminate most of these. 

http://www.123homeschool4me.com/2013/06/superhero-worksheets-for-kids.html

Boxes:

1) Trace the letter H (for Hero) these are crayola dry erase crayons & a felt rag the crayons come with.

2) Count the Spiders

CloseUp: 

3) Two days ago I only had four of these Sterilite 6.2Qt boxes. I found two more at walmart & have changed up the numbers on the original photos some of the boxes may have different numbers now because of it. This one is one of the few that I didn't laminate. I did put it in this sheet protector sleeve I found at the DollarTree. Also used with the dry erase crayola crayons. 

4) Now known as box number 4. Shadow Match. 

5) Superhero Puzzles: Now known as box number 5

6) Now known as box number 6. The child counts the superheroes & pins the correct numbered clothespin. This also helps with dexterity. I dyed the clothes pins with food coloring and rubbing alcohol. 

7) Match the picture to the Word name.

Closeup: How adorable? It even has one for Jesus and one for Daddy. 

8) Pattern Work, this is the preK version in the PDF are some harder patterns for older children.

9) Build a Word with Gatorade caps

CloseUp:

That's all for Jojo... I'll change these up as I see fit, if they're easy I may let him do them again one more day and change them up to something else on the second night before he gets up the third day. 

Luna's boxes, she's two & very independent. To a fault at times...lol 

Boxes:

1) Find and Build the puzzle. These are very simple puzzles. The pictures are 1) of a girl 2) of glue 3) of an apple. She will dig for the pieces through the dry beans and then build her puzzles once she finds the corresponding piece. Only two pieces per puzzle.

2) Color Match with pompoms and chopstick. I painted the muffinpan that I bought from the DollarTree. The chopsticks helps with dexterity. 

3) Lacing Pasta that I dyed with food coloring & rubbing alcohol.

4) Match the Sound: I made two of each egg some have sand, some rice, some corn kernels, etc... The child shakes them & matches them to the correct sounding egg. Each egg has a pair. 

5) Teaching life skills: Hammering. Everything but the golf tees were bought at the DollarTree. The golf tees were 100 for $5 from Amazon prime. 

6) More Life Skills: Screw board. Essentially the child screws in the screws. I bought everything but the wood from the DollarTree. The wood was a remnant from someone else's project. I love the mini screw driver, great for little hands. I did sand the wood so kids wouldn't get splinters in their hands and fingers. 

CloseUp:

7) PopsicleStick Match Up, it can be played two ways. 

CloseUp: The child can match the color of the stick with the color of the icecream or for an older child read the popsicle stick & match the word name with the color of the icecream. 

8) Match the pot with the popsicle stick. I dyed these with food coloring and rubbing alcohol. 

9) Lacing shapes: I only put in three. A circle, a butterfly & a heart. 

She'll likely play with these the whole week. 

The idea is that they play semi quietly & with minimal help from me while I school the older two kids. I hope these ideas help. If anyone has their own suggestions & ideas about what to do with toddlers while homeschooling older siblings please feel free to share. 

Start of 2014-2015 School Year/ A wrap up of the first two months.

We're already five weeks into the school year & I haven't taken their school pictures for the year. Last year I took it in September & since we started this new school year June 8th, 2014 I wanted the picture to be taken September 2014 so that in time we could see their growth from year to year. 

Here's the unofficial school picture though with the official to come in September... 

Please excuse the dirt all over my girls, they're making mud pies & Jojo always refuses to look at the camera. Taken today Thursady, August 7th, 2013. 

Some of the things we've done so far...

First week of school. We did a science experiment, where we discuss how a high amount of salt can make things float. We discusses how names are important & each person got a cupcake with their names. Lily made a scroll by copying Genesis 1:1 onto a piece of paper then rolling it in between two small wooden dowels. 

Mathias started Math U See because My Father's World Adventures (and all MFW from 2nd on ward) doesn't include a math. Since he's so right brained I figured this would be the best math curriculum for him.

The second week went by with out a hitch.

Mathias really enjoyed the third week of school when we discussed Christopher Columbus. He made The Niña, The Pinta & The Santa Maria. 

Jojo decided he needed to do school work. I tried to do MFW- K with him but his attention down wasn't there so I opted for more tot schooling. 

Lily continued along with her school work & was reading very well. 

Jojo & Luna did some tot schooling while Lily did her 1st grade work. 

During the fourth week Mathias built a wigwam. 

During the fourth week Lily made a clay pot to store her scroll in. 

During the fifth week I schooled everyone at the same time. Including Luna, 

whom I have had to make some tot schooling items for. 

I then took a few weeks off so that I could reorganize because if everything doesn't have its proper place I feel crazy & I'm unable to sit with the kids to do their curriculum work. Having everything sorted makes my days less hectic & the school days easier to accomplish.

I hate that my brain works that way because it feels like I should just push threw it but I really can't function unless things are uncluttered and neat. Sadly sometimes I miss a few weeks worth of school but by God's grace we started school in June so we're in no way behind.

We have two pantries and my husband was sweet enough to empty one out for me so that I could use it for all the extra homeschool items that were cluttering everything up. It took me two days to label everything & put it all away. How ever I now know everything I have, need & where to find it all. 

In between the organizing I spent some of the time making items for tot schooling. Like dying Lima beans for transferring games. 

Cutting up felt to look like cupcakes for a color matching game. 

Using food coloring to dye peg people & wooden pots for another color sorting game

Making sensory balloons. Two of each type of ballon, the child squeezes them & matches them up.

Making 2 of each smelling bottles. The child smells the bottles & matches them with the second bottles that smells like the first. 

Making sound eggs, two of each. The child has to shake them & match them up. 

Find the matching upper case & lower case letters and match them to each other to "dunk the cookie in the milk" game. These are cut outs from the dollar tree & they have all types you can make this game with anything. They have apples & worms, worms & fish, frogs & flies, etc...

And that has pretty much been the first few weeks of Adventures in My Father's World 2nd grade and My Father's World 1st grade. 

2013-2014 School Year Wrap Up

LilyI know, I said I was going to be more diligent about posting and I absolutely wasn't. There's nothing really to say about it. I just fell behind & let it go to the way side. However I'm going to try to do a quick review of the year. Mostly via pictures because I frankly don't remember much. Mathias & Lily finished up kindergarten & 1st grade the first week of June. These are the pictures from the 2023-2014 school year.

Lily doing some sand tracing, tacticle letter work. She would trace the "H"with her finger & then write it in the sand. The "h" on the wooden flower, I made from sand paper. The other two "h"s I bought at the dollar tree & they're made out of glitter. The biggest "h" I made from home made puffy paint on card stock. 

We used painters tape (from the dollar store) to do math. 1+5= The child starts at 1 & then hops 5 spots then looks arg the number they're standing on. We did this with subtraction too. They loved this. Even my 3 & 1 yr olds joined us. 

They enjoyed a unit on the water cycle. Luckily it had snowed so dad brought us a jar of snow inside to melt & evaporate. 

All four kids enjoyed making butter 

We used the dry erase table for place value work. 

The tots enjoyed school also

Lily used her whisper phone during her phonics work. 

Jojo had his first birthday & announced that he was going to be a big brother again. Yup...baby #6 is due in Thanks Giving, November 27th, 2014.

Lily decided she wanted to finish kindergarten so she hunkered down & finished it by June 4th, 2014.

Which of course then motivated Mathias to finish 1st grade because he coils to stand to be I to he same grade as his little sister. He finished it Sunday, June 7th, 2014.

Consequently they were both ubber excited about starting 1st & 2nd grade so Monday, June 8th, 2014 was their official start day of the 2014-2015 school year. 

I didn't include everything from the school year but I did include some of the most memorable things.