Animal Babies

Children learn best through play, which is one of the reasons I love the Experience Preschool curriculum.  They make learning fun with engaging games and hands on activities.  I have been fortunate enough to use it with all 3 of my kids, and all 3 of them love "school time."  My girls are older now, but they still like to do the crafts and help their brother out with the activities that are too hard for him right now.  

Ronan doesn't know English well enough to be able to answer which animal he would like to hug the most; but we were still able to use the conversation cards to name the animals and talk about them.  He is picking up new words all the time, so these are good activities to increase his vocabulary.  Both the girls wanted to hug the kitten.  

We read the monthly book that is included in Experience Preschool, The Lion and the Beetle.  

Every monthly box also comes with a durable puzzle related to the book of the month.  These puzzles are too hard for Ronan right now, but luckily he has big sisters who can step in and help when needed.  

We looked at a picture of gorillas and Ronan got to use a comb to paint ovals to look like their fur.  He loves to paint, but did not like using the comb.  He wanted to switch to a paint brush and use more colors, so that's what we did.  The art projects are child directed, which leads to more creativity.  Art projects have always been one of my kids favorite parts of preschool curriculum, and Experience Preschool has a new craft project every day.  

Every month with Experience Preschool focuses on 3 different letters.  This month they are C, S and R.  Ronan is just learning the alphabet and doesn't recognize letters yet so we simplify things quite a bit.  He started by covering letters with the manipulatives from this months box.  Then he rolled the pocket cube and we talked about the different objects, and I had him repeat the names to me.  We're still finishing up January's monthly box because Ronan was really sick for a while and is just getting his energy back.  

Waiting For Babies

This month with Experience Preschool (formerly Mother Goose Time) we're learning about baby animals, which is always a fun topic.  Week one focused on waiting for babies.

As always we started the new theme with a name tag.  Learning to recognize and write their name is a skill all preschoolers should learn.  

Ronan worked on counting by rolling a dice and then rolling the same number of "piglets" out of play-dough and putting them on the mama pig mat.  He loves using play-dough, and working with it helps build muscles for fine motor skills.  The preschool curriculum from Experience Early Learning includes math games that make counting and other math skills fun.  

Experience Preschool includes the materials needed for the daily crafts.  Ronan made a cat mask, but refused to wear it.  Elli liked it so much that she used his as a pattern and made her own.  

We also spent a day learning about animals that hatch from eggs.  Ronan used a white crayon to decorate an egg shape, and then painted over it with water colors.  When you paint over the crayon the white lines show through.  

The shape of the month for Experience Preschool is the oval.  Ronan traced around rubber bands to make oval shapes.  Each month the preschool curriculum focuses on a different shape and color.  

Ronan collected eggs and then opened them to find hidden shapes, which are one of this months manipulatives.