Early Childhood Learning

Homeschooling HelpLet’s Play And Learn!
Written By Laurie Spigel
“The goal of early childhood education should be
to activate the child’s own natural desire to learn.”
— MARIA MONTESSORI

When kids are born, they are being homeschooled from birth!

Learning happens when the environment allows it and the individual takes advantage of it. It is up to the parent or teacher to create the right environment and support the learning experience. We can’t learn for our children or students, and we can’t force learning to happen. It occurs naturally, when the conditions are right. As parents, we try to provide our children with proper nutrition, good health, and an environment that supports learning. We do this from the very start.

When I was pregnant, my husband and I talked to our child. We played music; I sang and read to my unborn baby. It has been proven that when babies are born they recognize their parents’ voices. On those first walks, with the baby snuggled in a front carrier, I pointed out birds and flowers by name. In the supermarket, wedging my baby in the cart seat when he could barely sit upright, I rattled off the names of vegetables and fruits as we wheeled passed the produce section, my baby bobbing along with each new bit of information. Together, we watched sunsets and explored beaches, wandered through parks looking at trees and squirrels, and looked up to see clouds and airplanes. We went to the library for toddler story-time and brought home new books each week. At home we finger painted, made our own playdough, sang silly songs, built forts by draping sheets over furniture, played and laughed a lot. At age 2, my toddler started helping me in the kitchen, trying to stir a pot or sweep the floor or hand me something that dropped to the floor. By age 3, we were playing counting games and recognizing letters and words on signs.

Educational Resources for Early Learners

Young children need physical movement, changes of scenery, lots of games and free play. They also need to communicate and be heard, to ask questions freely, and to express their imagination. Below are lots of resources and activities, mostly free online.

Physical and Sensory Games

Games can be played indoors, outdoors, in different rooms and locations. Physical games can also be played just before and after inactive periods, such as car rides, meal times, and reading time.

100 Ways to Play! from the Boston Children’s Museum, free download.

Music can be combined with physical movements, such as yoga for children, dancing and rolling on the floor, pretending to be ocean animals or flowers or imaginary creatures. Musical chairs, head-shoulders-knees-and-toes, catch with a lightweight ball, tossing or rolling a ball back and forth, and tossing a ball or beanbag into a box or at a large target.

Sensory Play

Sensory play can include math, science, art and more. Create sensory play bins filled with sand, water, and other materials. Make a small sandbox using a plastic basic with a lid (for easy storage) and some tools like a spoon, pail, and small containers. Bins can be filled with anything textural, such as Cheerios or any O cereal, or dried chick peas, or shredded paper or pompoms (anything you think is safe for your toddler to play with), with tools such as a scoop, ladle, and measuring cups. A water bin can be placed inside a larger bin to contain spillage, and equipped with ice cube tray, cup or bowl, ladle and funnel (and so on), for playful experimentation. Here are 15 easy sensory bins for toddlers and preschoolers. Move items from one area to another, count and sort the items, name their colors, feel the textures, note the smells, describe the shapes and build images and imaginary settings. Go on a sensory adventure together, and discover, learn, explore! At this age, learning happens through play. So have fun!

Build a Sensory Walk, pdf from the Boston Children’s Museum.

Discipline

In my experience, the use of play and games is a deterrent to discipline problems, partly because kids don’t want the games to stop! Here is a resource for play as therapy:

Play Therapy Activities: 101 Play-Based Exercises to Improve Behavior and Strengthen the Parent-Child Connection by Melissa LaVigne, play therapist.

Activities that calm the nervous system and create balance in groups:

  • play daily and often, together and alone

  • notice when the kids need a change of pace or scenery and give it to them

  • connect with nature daily

  • be active outdoors

Free Tips for Parents from Conscious Discipline, which has helped early childhood educators around the world.

Language Arts and Verbal Communication

Choose library books together and read out loud every day. I recommend weekly library visits at a toddler storytime of your choice, where children hear a story read aloud and meet other kids. Before or after the event, select some books to borrow. I’d say, “You pick two; I’ll pick two),” and later we’d go home and read all four. Then the child would select bedtime reading from that pile or from other favorites in the house, and the following week we’d return the books and borrow some more.

Talk to your child! Introduce new words. Say what’s being made for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Point out various fruits & vegetables, trees & flowers, colors & textures, dogs, cats, birds- the world is full of opportunities to introduce new information simply and directly to a child.

Sing songs, silly songs, nursery rhymes, and songs with finger-play, such as The Eensy Weensy Spider (also known as the Itsy Bitsy Spider) and Where is Thumbkin, a game that identifies the fingers.

Make personalized early readers for your child, using their own words, stories, and experiences. The first book I made for my kids was about their family. I also made books about a trip to the zoo, a visit from grandparents, their daily walk, and other activities and events in their lives.

Five free phonics websites for kids.

Verbal Games

I Spy, using a color or initial sounds rather than letters.

Name Six, find or name six items that begin with the same letter or initial sound. This game can be played in any setting, for example, find six items that begin with M in this aisle of the supermarket.

Build-a-Story, taking turns, one sentence (or a few sentences) at a time, each person adds to a story. You can start by creating a nonsense title by having three people each choose a word, maybe a place, a color, and an animal, and using that as a title (examples: Blue New York Dog or Happy Ocean Elephant). Of course, the story that results doesn’t have to relate to the title at all!

I Went to The Market (And Bought), or When My Ship Comes In (It Will Hold). This is a memory game. Each player adds another item that the next player must repeat. Maybe the first player says “peacocks” and the second player says “peacocks and donuts” and the third player says “peacocks, donuts and sunglasses” and so on, each naming any item them want after repeating the rest. Older kids can play this game using the alphabet. Most play this game with the rule that when someone misses (forgets) an item they are out. A variation where nobody is out allows fellow players to give a hint, perhaps a silent action (such as pretending to put on sunglasses to remind the player of that word).

Pre-Writing Activities

Doodling and drawing with nontoxic toddler crayons is the first step to writing. Those loopy, curvy shapes are the best practice for writing later. Encourage lots of free-style drawing. See art activities.

Learning Without Tears has a pre-writing readiness program, with several activities including forming capital letters with four basic shapes made out of wood. Learning Resources has a similarly priced kit made of plastic. The shapes are large curves, small curves, large sticks, and small sticks. Examples: P is a large stick and a small curve; B is a large stick and two small curves; A is two large sticks and one small stick. It’s possible to make an inexpensive version of this kit at home, cutting cardboard or foam board into the desired shapes.

Children can also make the letters out of clay by rolling clay into snake shapes and using each “them to form capital letters. This is a sensory technique that can help children with learning difficulties to learn the entire alphabet, one clay shape at a time.

Social Studies & Geography

Early Childhood Education from the National Museum of African American History and Culture for birth to age 8, with free downloadable activity book and Black history resources.

Recognize and discuss different occupations encountered in daily life, such as trash collector, teacher, firefighter, cashier, doorman, doctor, bus driver, and so on. Find a picture book in the library and read about that occupation. Get or make some hats and play dress up pretending to be those occupations. Look at pictures of people in other countries with the same occupations. For example, find out what a police officer wears in New York City, in Paris, France, and in Buenos Aires?

Make a Step Book with and for your child, using this video tutorial by Susan Gaylord. At the end of the video Gaylord shows finished examples of Step Books, one about sizes (small, medium, large), another that is a counting book from one to ten (her example is in Korean), and another titled Where in the World I Am which starts with the town or city and with each page shows the larger world of the child.

Learn about your neighborhood. Walk your block. Visit the grocery store, post office, bank, parks and playgrounds. What are some things that are different, and some things that are the same, about two different playgrounds (or parks, or grocery stores). Meet different people in the neighborhood and ask them questions. What kind of work do they do? Where are they from? What did they like to do when they were little kids?

Math and Science

Make a counting book (see the Step Book video, linked above). You can use a simple blank book and illustrate it with your child’s favorite objects, perhaps a book of dogs or cars or foods, with one item on the first page and five on the last page (for a 5-page blank board book), or use a larger blank book for ten illustrated items.

Math Games for pre-K, free from Math for Love.

Donald Duck in MathMagic Land, fun math video on YouTube for ages 2 and up.

Pre-K Math Goals from Everyday Math published by the University of Chicago.

Take a nature walk and ask questions about the trees, flowers, bugs, dirt, sky. Many of the questions kids ask naturally are science questions! Bring a magnifying glass and take a closer look at a blade of grass or an insect or a bit of tree bark. Lift a rock and see what lives underneath. See if your library has the Backpack Explorer series for ages 3-6, with books on rocks, trees, birds, bugs and more.

Using the water play bin (above in sensory play) or the bathtub, play the game Will It Sink or Will It Float? using handy objects. Talk about why she things float and other things sink. See you can take something that floats and add weight to it to make it sink.

Here are more ways to explore water with toddlers.

What’s heavier? Pick up objects around the house and decide which is lighter and which is heavier. If you have a balance scale, test your theory and see if the heavier object weighs down that side of the scale while the lighter object stays higher.

Talk about sizes (see the Step Book video for book you can make together about size). Of course, size is relative. I used to play a game with my kids, asking if that building was big or little. “Big!” they would say. “Compared to a mountain?” I would ask, and they’d laugh. Then I’d ask them to find something small, and they might show me a leaf from a tree, and I would ask, “Is the leaf small to that bug?” and they would realize that to a bug the leaf was as big as a house!

Hands-On Science Activities for ages 2-4 (free) from the Homeschool Den.

Mudpies to Magnets: A Preschool Science Curriculum by Robert A. Williams and Robert B. Rockwell, a book of simple experiments for ages 2-4.

Art

Playdough combines science, sensory play, art and more. Here’s a play dough recipe and activities from the BBC, and here’s another play dough recipe.

Finger-painting is a sensory, tactile experience, perfect for toddlers. Here are two recipes for home-made finger-paint. You can buy finger painting paper that has a smooth, glossy surface, just right for wet finger-paint. For you can make mono-prints. My toddler would paint directly onto the kitchen counter, or for a more protected easy-to-clean-up-space, paint directly on the sides of the bathtub. Then I would lightly press a large piece of paper and carefully peel it back off the surface, making a mono-print (one-time print). After drying, tape the art to the wall or fridge.

Ice Painting, an activity you can do at home the combines art and science, from the Boston Children’s Museum. The ice melts and becomes watercolor paint, and wax crayons resist the watercolor paint. Watch the whole video in order to be well prepared.

Art Lessons for Early Learners from MoMA, free, from The Museum Modern Art in NYC

Art Lessons for Pre-K from the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D. C.

Art Tales for Pre-K from the National Gallery of Art.

Early Learning Resources in a variety of subjects

Activities for Early Learners from the Smithsonian for ages 1 and up.

Fairy Dust Teaching, an early educator’s blog full of activities and articles and references to Waldorf and Reggio-Emilia.

50 Montessori Practical Life Activities for toddlers - things every toddler should know!

Reggio-Emilia child-led activities you can do at home, for early learners, from Reggio Children.

Preschool Curriculum

Subscription Boxes

Activity Books

  • Science is Simple: Over 250 Activities for Preschoolers, by Peggy Ashbrook

  • Math Play! 80 Ways to Learn to Count by Diane McGowan, Mark Schrooten.

  • Scribble Art: Independent Creative Art Experiences for Children by MaryAnn F. Kohl

  • The Ultimate Preschool Activity Guide: Over 200 Fun Learning Activities for ages 3-5 by Autumn McKay

  • Preschooler's Busy Book 365 Creative Games & Activities To Occupy 3-6 Year Olds by Trish Kuffner (also author of The Toddler's Busy Book)

  • The Complete Resource Book for Preschoolers: an Early Childhood Curriculum with over 2,000 Activities and Ideas, by Pam Schiller and Kay Hastings, with thematically related activities.

Favorite Books for Young Children

When reading aloud, don’t limit yourself to kids books. I read a wide range of material to my kids: great poems, bits of Shakespeare, song lyrics, and lots of children’s books too.

  • The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats

  • Where the Wild Things Are, and all titles by Maurice Sendak

  • Papa, Please Get the Moon for Me and other titles by Eric Carle

  • Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

  • Grandfather Twilight by Barbara Helen Berger

  • Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson

  • Little Bear by Elsa Holmelund Minarik

  • Each Peach Pear Plum (an "I Spy" book), by Allan Ahlberg, Janet Ahlberg illus.

  • Little Blue and Little Yellow by Leo Lionni

Early Readers

  • Frog and Toad (series) by Arnold Lobel

  • Magic Treehouse (series) by Mary Pope Osborne

  • Nate the Great (series) by Marjorie Sharmat

  • Time Warp Trio (series and other titles) by Jon Sczieska and Lane Smith

  • The Cat Who Wished to Be a Man by Lloyd Alexander

  • Anansi the Spider: A Tale From The Ashanti (and other myths and folktales) written and illustrated by Gerald McDermott

Magazines

Kids love to get actual mail, and may get a special thrill out of seeing their name on an address label. Even babies and toddlers can discover the joy of a subscription. Check out a sample issue on-line or browse them at your local library before you subscribe. When my kids got older, they chose they own magazine subscriptions.

Books for Educators and Parents

The Sun’s Not Broken, A Cloud’s Just in the Way: On Child-Centered Teaching by Sydney Gurewitz Clemens, early childhood educator

Seeing Young Children With New Eyes by Sydney Gurewitz Clemens and Leslie Gleim, early childhood educators

Play Therapy Activities: 101 Play-Based Exercises to Improve Behavior and Strengthen the Parent-Child Connection by Melissa LaVigne, play therapist.

Magical Child by Joseph Chilton Pearce

Laurie Spigel
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