Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Tot School Tuesday: Photo free edition

Please find it in your hearts to forgive the lack of personal pictures.  I dropped my camera at Colton's birthday party and it hasn't worked since.  So I have no pictures for our tot school post this week.

I do however have some thoughts on tot school I still would love to share.  There will be amazon links in this post.  They are NOT affiliate links.  I do not get anything if you click and purchase something or anything like that.  I'm not cool enough to figure that sort of thing out so these links are just "here go check out these awesome things and then buy or borrow them if you like them" links.

One thing Sierra and I did in her tot school this last week was read a fun "action" book.  Calling All Toddlers


Sierra LOVED this.  She loved doing the movements that the first poem in the book calls for.  To be honest we only did the first one in the book and I've only skimmed over the rest.  I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned this here on the blog but prior to having children teaching 2yr olds on a daily basis was actually my paid job.  Shame nobody pays me for it now. lol  So in my three years of doing that I came across lots of great books that included movement to get the kids more involved in things.  Going on a Bear Hunt is great, Monkeys jumping on a bed is always a classic.

I love books too that allow me to point out shapes, colors, animal names and sounds.  This past week completely by coincidence I worked on animal names and sounds with Sierra.  She is now fantastic at mooing, meowing, and as always ruffing.  We practiced these sounds while reading What Shall We Do With The Boo-Hoo Baby?  This book was super cute and both Sierra and Sawyer LOVED it.  I'm a little tired of it now.  We also read Duck on a Bike by David Shannon (we love his books - No David! is practically my life with Sawyer and Sawyer's favorite book).
In the past I've shied away from reading with my toddlers.  Not because it wasn't enjoyable but because it wasn't enjoyable. lol  No, really, the fact of the matter is that having 2 and 3 and 4 kids clambering all over you, digging their elbows and knees into parts of your body you'd rather have left alone but are now covered in bruises just never did come off as enjoyable to me.  We're doing things a bit differently around here the past couple of weeks so school time with Sierra is school time with just her (and likewise with the boys).  One child sitting calmly on my lap or in front of me with nobody getting in their way of seeing the pictures makes for a MUCH more enjoyable reading aloud experience.  I think reading with our children is important.  I think it's even fun if you pick good books.

For my tot another favorite of her books are touch and feel books.  She's not terribly picky about brand name on the book but we have and love several of the Usborne books from the "That's not my..." series.  These things hold up well.  The truck one we have is from when Kayd was about 1.  So it's held up 5yrs and it is still in excellent shape.  

*I want to pause here and say that I am an independent consultant for Usborne books and if you click on that link there above it will take you directly to MY Usborne books sales site so any orders you would place through that link would earn me a commission.  Interest of full disclosure and all that blog jazz I see all over blog land (I'm so not a techy, really, I'm not!)

Sierra will often bring me one of those, I'll read it to her, she'll hold out her hand so I can "help" her feel the thing on the page.  It's very cute and makes me chuckle because she's very capable of just touching the things herself (and often does before holding her hand up to me).  When we finish the book she's happy to take it and "read" it to herself a second time.

So basically this past week of tot school consisted of reading.  We also colored.  She colors daily.  She loves to color and "write".  It's also very cute.

And just for the sake of adding at least one picture of the cutie here is what she studied during Colton's birthday party:

She discovered dandelions.  She looks so sweet sitting in this "field" of them playing and experimenting with them.
 

As with last week I am linking up to the linky party at Confessions of a Homeschooler so do go check out the other great tot posts.





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