This school year is feeling strange for us all. For us, things don’t feel quite as weird since we are not yet at the school-aged stage, but it still has bummed me out that we can’t attend the toddler class we were originally enrolled in.
It is still really important to me that Hudson gets a year full of learning and play! I am the type of person that needs a very clear plan and structure to make this happen. I have pulled on some of my teacher skills, and I have begun the process of making a 26-week ABC curriculum. This will help kick off our Tot School/Mommy Play-school (basically think of it as the pre-preschool).
Quick side-note, if you too have a 2-3 year-old and would like to implement a Tot School at home with your little one, I have found this resource from Mrs. Plemon’s Kindergarten to be super helpful.
I am creating this as we go, but this first week has proven to be a lot of fun! Most of the learning and activities will take place within our home, but I have coordinated with a few mom friends to add a social element (we are being careful and safe, but after months of very minimal social interactions with friends, H and I both desperately need this social space). With one set of friends, we will be doing weekly adventure field trips. With the other set of friends, we will be decorating the letter of the week and reading a book together.
If you would like to download the alphabet book I created, you can purchase it for just $2 on my Teachers Pay Teachers Store! The book is bright and colorful and image based. I intentionally made the letters extra big and it is perfect for your little learner.
Each week, I will be summarizing our week of learning here on the blog. I will be linking to the books, products and resources we use! I hope you find this helpful and fun!
Week 1: The Letter A
Letter A Books
Ten Apples Up on Top by Dr. Seuss
There’s An Alligator Under My Bed by Mercer Mayer
How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World by Marjorie Priceman
Hey Little Ant by Phillip H. Hoose
Letter A Curriculum
You can download a full week of letter A curriculum for FREE on my TpT shop! If you download it, I would love for you to leave a review! Within this curriculum, you will find a weekly calendar that gives you a book and an activity for each day of the week! I also list the early learning standards. Within the curriculum, I give you a few learning activities to do at-home. I also outline some activity ideas not included in the packet. The main intention behind this weekly curriculum I am making, is to give you some inspiration and structure! It is easy to get lost in the rabbit hole that is Pinterest, so I do the hard work of planning and brainstorming for you! All you need to do is print and have fun with your little one!
Monday: Airplane Park Field Trip + Airplane Size Sorting
We went to Jose Del Valle Park in Lakewood. Of course, most of this park is still closed, but we did all of our activities by the big airplane structure within the park. It made for fun photos and was the perfect setting for learning about airplanes! We read some airplane books, made paper airplanes, and did the airplane size sorting activity (in free curriculum here). This is a simple activity and works best if you laminate the airplanes so they are sturdy and can be used again and again. This activity is great for color recognition + size sorting! I found it worked best as an invitation-to-play. I simply set it out in our living room and Hudson gravitated right towards it.
Tuesday: Letter A Apple Stamping
Each week, we are going to decorate the letter of the week! By the end of the 26 weeks, I will laminate each letter and bind it together in a book. This will be a great keepsake for H and his friends! If you too would like to create an alphabet book with your little one, you can purchase it for just $2 on my Tpt Store. This week, we read Ten Apples Up on Top and then decorated the letter A by stamping apple halves. This is a fun and simple activity! We of course added a bit of glitter at the end for fun!
Wednesday: Alligator Counting Activity
In the afternoon, after Hudson’s nap, I set up an outdoor classroom for him since it was so hot in our house. We read There’s An Alligator Under My Bed by Mercer Mayer. This is a new favorite book of ours and is perfect for the letter A week. During this particular read-aloud, I really emphasized the word alligator and had H point to the alligator on each page. He was really into it. The counting part of the lesson, he was not as into, but this will take time. He is only 2! We kept it light and fun as we worked on our counting skills from 1-5. Again, you can get these “How Many Alligators Are Under My Bed?” counting mats for FREE when you download my Letter A Week Curriculum.
Thursday: Apple Pie Scissor Cutting Tray + Apple Pie Making
This day was all about apple pie! In the morning, I set up a really simple scissor cutting practice tray. These apple pie printables are a fun way to practice scissor cutting skills and work on understanding parts of a whole. This was a bit advanced for my 2-year-old, but would be perfect for your 3-4 year-old. We focused on working with scissors to cut our pretend apple pie made of play-dough.
In the afternoon, we read the book, How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World. Then, we worked in the kitchen and with some help from Grammy and Auntie, made a delicious apple pie! Another great way to make this activity more toddler-friendly, is to buy pre-made pie dough and just have your little one mix apple filling and place in pie tin. The whole process of making a pie was a bit too long for little H.
Friday: Ants Go Marching Activity + Ants on a Log Snack Making
To finish off the week, we focused on ants! I set-up a make-your-own ants on a log snack tray. I let H do it all on his own. He really enjoyed the independence. This is a fun snack tray and a built-in activity that only requires celery sticks, peanut butter, and raisins!
After this activity, we listened to the Ants Go Marching One by One and used the little laminated ants I made to form the A and a (this activity is also in my free letter A curriculum). Again, H was not as into this, but we will eventually get there. It was still a great activity to show H what the Aa looks like and it paired nicely with the book, Hey, Little Ant. We both really enjoy this story and it is a great one for teaching about different perspectives.
Letter A Sensory Bin
At the start of each week, I will be creating a sensory bin with all letter A things for Hudson to look at and interact with throughout the week.
You can download this week of curriculum for free at my TpT store!
This Mama Needs Grace 
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