If you had read my Quick Takes post last Friday, you would know that I found this great site with educational curriculum from age 3 mos and up.
Since I seriously started looking at the site and printing a bunch of stuff off, I’ve been going through what I DID bring with me and what I need to fill in the holes of stuff we have for her. She suggests several areas of study for a child 1-2 years old:
- Literature
- Poetry
- Bible
- Nursery Rhymes
- Speech/Vocabulary
- Sign Language
- Indoor Games
- Outdoor Games
- Classical Music
- Musical Exploration
- Children’s Songs
- Lullabies
- Foreign Language
- Puppetry
- Nature Study
- Exercise
- Arts and Crafts
- Art Appreciation
Phew! What a lot of stuff that I haven’t even been thinking about! I like a lot of her activities but like most homeschoolers, I’m sure, I like the idea of being able to change it to fit what I like and what I want her to know.
I’m not sure if she is Catholic (I don’t think so) but I’m going to share how I modify her program to fit the needs of our family.
Literature – She has a wonderful library of books that she uses for this program but due to space and budgetary reasons, I just can’t make myself buy them all. What I HAVE done is determine the themes of what her books are about and make sure that we have books that are family favorites and/or on the following subjects:
- numbers
- colors
- alphabet
- bedtime
- love
- shapes
- animals
- seasons
Poetry – right now I’m going with her suggestions and am finding some new works. I love being able to learn right along with my kids :).
Bible- I have a Read and Learn Bible as well as books about individual holidays (Easter, Christmas). I’m going to expand this to teach about the Catholic faith (Mary & the Saints) as well as traditional prayers.
Nursery Rhymes- I really wish I had brought my Real Mother Goose Rhymes book from when *I* was little. But I can look up my favorites online if I want to change it up.
Speech & vocabulary- I’m keeping that just the way she has it for the time being.
Sign Language- I have a Sign, Sing and Play Kit and I finally dug into the contents of that. Boy I wish I had done THAT sooner. I’ll probably use those activities and songs.
Indoor Games- I will probably use her suggestions mixed with a book I bought last summer – Gymboree Play and Learn. It has activities to learn up to age 3, I think (I left that up North, too. :().
Outdoor Games- combination of her suggestions and Lil Bit’s lead.
Classical Music- we have a TON of it. I anticipate that we will go with the flow on that…maybe we will try to learn composers & pieces ourselves :).
Musical Exploration- we go in spurts on this. Will probably follow her lead wherever possible.
Children’s Songs – This one is particularly hard for me. I hate hearing kids sing..and I won’t apologize for it. I think I need to have my memory jogged for ideas and them sing them with her/to her. Do you know of any? Or at the least, ones that are less annoying than others?
Lullabies- another one where I’m picky. I don’t want annoying lullabies so I have to find some that sound, well, like normal music. Hello iTunes :).
Foreign Language & Puppetry – I know nothing. ‘Nuff said.
Nature Study- her ideas plus I might look for more. An area of idea research. Do you have any thoughts?
Exercise – her ideas plus Tae Kwon Do stuff where possible.
Arts & Crafts- her lead.
Art Appreciation- frankly, I never thought about that one. But I found a cool Baby Einstein book at Ross recently called Windows to Color. It’s really cool because it shows the normal little kid color book stuff, but it also has a picture of a work of art that is primarily the color being discussed with the artist info at the bottom. Even Bones thought it was kind of a cool book.
Do you have any resources for children this young? Share them in the comments or post a link to your post about this topic.