We began our first homeschooling year with two 3-year-olds, a 6-year-old, and a 7-year-old! Our “preschool” activities are pretty simple! There’s a lot going on in Mom’s homeroom class! 😉 Now our twins are 4 years old and our big kids are 7 and 8! We are nearing the end of our year, and things have worked! Whew! The littles have been learning a letter a week, and they love their 30 minutes of preschool with Mom each morning! This post is a wrap up of the last half of the alphabet. Don’t ask me where the first half is… I guess I was too busy to snap pictures!
We learn a letter a week using A Beka animal flash cards and language development posters. We needed some language development! 🙂 Jack is reading, and Mary Sorrels is not far behind! I have also loved using Early Education at Home: A Curriculum Guide for Parents of Pre-Schoolers and Kindergarteners. I got a used copy! It is a simple book giving letter activities for each week, character qualities, snack ideas, field trip suggestions, and Bible characters beginning with each letter.
A Beka
Early Education at Home
I keep this handwriting saved on my desktop. I change the letter each week, print it off, and cut it in half so that we can practice writing our names and letters.
We practice writing our names and letters.
Now for the {very simple} last half of the alphabet wrap up….
Ll is for ladybug!
Mm is for monkey, moon, mouse, and macaroni! You can see our Mm post here.
We also made easy, delicious Crockpot Macaroni and Cheese! You don’t even have to cook the noodles first!
Nn is for nest and Noah’s rainbow!
Oo is for octopus.
Pp is for pink putty, purple play-doh, and peanut butter! You can see our Pp post here!
Qq is for Queen Esther and quilt. You can print Queen Esther, Vashti, Ahasuerus, Mordecai, and Haman masks here!
cracker quilt
Rr is for reptiles!
Ss is for smiles, sticks, S-shaped hotdogs, and spiders.
Tt is for toes on Ts.
Uu is for underground and umbrellas! We used a package of umbrella straws all week and put little toothpick umbrellas in our food! Fun!
Vv is for vegetables! (We also painted vegetables last summer and used okra to paint part of our Psalm 1 artwork! )
Ww is for water! Playing in the water {with permission!} is fun!
Xx is for X-ray!
Yy is for yarn and yellow! We found a lot of Y-shaped sticks!
Zz is for zipper and zinnias! We made zipper bag ice cream and planted zinnias.
It wasn’t until the very end of our letter weeks that I found these ABC Bible Printables! There is one for each letter of the alphabet!
As much as the twins love their preschool time, they love learning with their big brother and sister even more.
One of the most beautiful things about homeschool is the opportunity we have to learn as a family. I love seeing my children play and learn and work together! It fills my heart with JOY!
HAPPY LETTER LEARNING!
(Some of these pictures are from our fun on the first day of summer and our pumpkin party! You can click to visit.)
Fun on the first day of summer!
We had a fun week of pumpkin lessons!
You might also enjoy: The little ones? During homeschool? Oh, they play with the trash!
i have no greater joy 
I love the Early Education book. We used it with my first 2 kiddies. We may have to pull out that book again for my younger two kids. Do you have any suggestions for keeping 2-year-olds occupied? I don’t think I had any trouble with my other kids when they were this age? But, my #4 is definitely an active, little guy. Also, what do you do with your older kids when you spend that 30 minutes of preschool? I feel like I’m neglecting my younger kids sometimes.
First, I’m sure your littles get lots of your time! 😉 I am convinced that most kids don’t need preschool but can learn from life– especially if they have older siblings! But, I’ve shared with you that my littles have had developmental delays and have been in “special” programs. We are progressing, praise God, but I felt that I needed to do some structured learning. To help facilitate that, my big kids can self start in 2 or 3 subjects. What they do rotates depending on the day, but they can do spelling, copywork, and Latin on their own. They do that right after our family hymn, prayer, Bible time while we have “preschool.” (If they do their best work and finish before preschool is over, they have a few minutes of free time.) I know your big kids can do more independently than mine can though! When I put off preschool until later in the day, I never got to it, so it is first now. As for keeping toddlers occupied, I rotate toys– daily. I packed up almost everything into bins and pull a different one out each morning. We have a Lego bin, cars & trucks bin, puzzle bin, tea party bin, etc. They don’t get bored as easily because they only see the toys once per week. I might also let them use markers one day, scissors and notecards one day, stickers one day, play doh one day, etc. But I think rotating is the key! They also take turns doing sight words or games on the iPad… anything easy for Mom!
Thank you for all the ideas! This really helps!
I’ve appreciated your blog since the day I started following it. I nominated you for the Super Sweet Blogging Award because I think it totally describes you!
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You are so creative! I would have been worn out by letter B. Love all the snack ideas.
If I had four boys and one in the tummy, I’d be worn out by B, too! Whew! You are so creative in showing all those boys our Creator in way that goes waaay beyond cute snacks!! I need lessons! 🙂
Very creative indeed! Great job on all the super fun snacks and crafts! I especially like the lacing using a meat tray (?) — did you just push holes into it with a sharp object, because I’m thinking my hole puncher won’t reach in that far. 🙂
Yes, meat trays, and yes, I used a pen. I didn’t have shoelaces, but yarn was better for Yy week! I just taped the ends. I sometimes wonder if the letter snacks and crafts are pointless, but the littles really remember them! I love it! I need to work on some fine motor skills that you’ve posted about! Thanks for your great ideas!
Yeah for Bible characters with your letter units! Gonna use that one! Also, love the pic of planting zinnias where Mary is looking up at you. Nothing but blue eyes!!
The silly smiles and spider snacks are really cute! I agree that the snacks and crafts help make the lessons (and letters!) more fun to learn and more memorable. Sure, they could be left out and the kids could still learn their letters, but the more fun you can make it, the better! Personally, I find it hard to be intentional about doing “creative” things with my kids if I don’t have a theme to go off of, so having a weekly theme helped me to come up with crafts and activities to keep them engaged (especially necessary during our long winters). You’ve done a fantastic job! I can’t believe they are reading already!!! Yay! Joseph knows the letter sounds really well now, so I’m going to take some small steps toward reading with him now and see how it goes . . .
Only Jack is reading, and I had nothing to do with it! Ha! I think he is special. None of my other children were reading at 4. It’s big words, too. Strange. He will say, “That says tomato ketchup.” or “Does that say seasonal collection?” I’m not sure how to explain it!
That’s truly amazing! Sounds like a very bright young boy 🙂
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