OneLuckeyWife

I noticed a lot of people on Facebook where asking about how to get started with homeschooling and what people do for their toddlers. In Texas, it’s very simple. You just send a letter or email to your child’s school letting them know you are withdrawing your child with the intent of homeschooling. Then begin homeschooling. Every state has different laws of what needs to be taught and what you need to do as far as testing. This website is very helpful for information by state. You’ll need to get a curriculum that you feel will be a good fit for your family. There are religious and secular (non-religious) curriculums. I have chosen Timberdoodle. They are a hands-on curriculum, offer both religious and non, you can customize your kits and they even have a scheduler to help you know what needs to get done each week. Here is what we do for preschool. I did these myself; it’s not Timberdoodle. These are the games I used or made.  Monday: books (she picks one and 1 about letters),

Our daughter is 2.5 now. We’ve been doing the same schedule for awhile now works great for us but might not work for everyone. 8-9: wake up, go potty, get dressed (she picks her own clothes), breakfast with milk or water, brush teeth 10-12: school time, play time 12-1: lunch with water or juice 1-6: story time, dance and singing, play time 6-7: dinner 7-8: play time 8-9: bath/shower time, brush teeth, story, bed She doesn’t wake during the night or take naps because then she’ll stay up forever.

We had a foreign exchange college student come to our house one day and he was selling these books from Skwids . I do like these books. They have Ask Me About books, two books that are like dictionaries for kids, shapes, colors, letter and number books. We got 2 sticker books and posters. I did laminate the posters first, they are about 16x24 inch. Pros: the books are big, sturdy, have bright colors and fun pictures. They also have words in both English and Spanish. Cons: price; we went with the least expensive package and they were still extremely expensive. We did get like 18 books, 2 sticker books and posters for the price but it was the most expensive thing we’ve bought for preschool. They are in no way a curriculum but more of a supplemental tool.

For our daughter’s preschool I have done a lot through games. I got flash cards and magnet  (letters/numbers). A simple cookie sheet makes the magnets stick so the child can match them to the cards.  For shapes/colors I got construction paper and cut out shapes. Then colored some clothes pins with markers to match. For white I had to cut out paper and glue it in. Also, my construction paper didn’t come with brown. This is also good for motor skills with using the clothes pin.  The beanbags I got from Amazon. I use the bucket so she can throw them in the bucket once she gets the bag I ask for. Our daughter loves to have me move the bucket so she has a moving target.  These popsicles are from Amazon. She can go by color or letters. Each popsicle has 2 letters one on the front and one on the back. Very well made in my opinion.  Egg shapes are from Amazon. Each egg is a different shape and two eggs are the same color so she can’t just go by color alone.

I absolutely love the Big Preschool Workbook by School Zone. It is a very comprehensive book of everything for a preschool student. It has really bright colors and fun pictures that keep my daughter interested. I do have to limit how many pages she can do a day otherwise she’d do the whole book. I tore out the pages and put them in a binder for easy access. This book goes over letters both upper and lower, numbers, colors, shapes, finding things, etc. It even has a bit for critical thinking which I really like. The book is done in sections like all the letters are together. So what I did was get whatever letter we were on and then a line work page to do with it. Or a shapes page with a colors page. That way it wasn't just all of one section from the book at a time. Bur you can really do this book however works best for your child. At first for this book I was putting the pages in sheet protectors and using expo markers so that I could reuse them but I found our daughter lik

We got a Wipe Clean book at Walmart. It has a lot of things for kids to work on with writing. The inside covers are blank so we use those to practice more than the actual pages so far but as she get older she’ll be able to fully use it. What I really looks about this book is that you can reuse it as many times as you want. I like the longevity of the book. It starts with writing letters but it even has analog clock practice. I found to be downsides are the expo marker that comes with the book is just awful so I suggest getting better ones. The letters are also small for if your child is writing for the first time it might be difficult for them to stay within the space provided. The last con to this book is that the pages can very easily become bent because the lamination on the pages is very small so they aren’t as stiff as I would like them to be.  Overall it is a nice little starter book for your child to work on. It is also great if you are tight on money and want an item

Our daughter really enjoys the books for the LeapStart . I love that she can do them on her own or with us. It’s all done in a game format so the child has fun but is learning at the same time. They have a variety of subjects and books for different ages. All of them are educational from alphabet to reading LeapFrog has a book for it. The books are nice and colorful with cute pictures to keep your child engage for quite awhile. In the back of each book is a section of the different skills that can be learned with the book. They give you stickers that match the book so you can sticker off as your child obtains each skill. I really enjoy thing aspect of the books because then it gives you an idea of what areas you need to focus on with your child. You know what can be reviewed and what you should help them with. Plus it is always exciting to add a sticker of completed skills. The biggest positive is that your child is learning so much in such a fun way that they don't even realize th