How to provide preschool when you can’t afford to send your child

In today’s economy many families are being forced to remove their children from daycares and preschools due to the heavy expense.  This is leaving many families with a feeling of worry that their children will not be successful upon entering school since they are being deprived of this important experience.  Understandably families are frustrated and concerned but there are many things you can do at home to keep your children busy and learning as if they were still in “school.”

Does this mean you are going to have to evolve into a “teacher” and have rigid order in the home – absolutely not!  In fact, quite the contrary.  The hard part for teachers is the sheer number of children they have in the classroom.  When you have that many little ones together in a room you have to create order first so that learning will occur second.  However, in your home environment this is not the case.

Wiggle Giggle Learn offers weekly activity plans that provide a daily activity/game/tip and educational goals  for your child’s developmental age.  For less than two dollars a week you can be your child’s first teacher and the worries of not being able to afford academic childcare/preschool will be gone forever.

Here is a list of things you may want to use to keep the learning going at home:

Social Development

1. Take your children on weekly trips to the park or a fast food play area to interact with other children – make sure to teach them rules in these areas, like wait your turn and slide down the slide instead of walking up it.

2. Have pretend tea parties or camp outs with your children’s favorite stuffed animals and encourage them to have imaginary dialogue with the stuffed friends – this will not take much encouragement because most three to five year olds naturally talk to and for inanimate things

Emotional Development

1. Take turns allowing your children to be leader of various rituals in the home – if you have a single child, take turns between you and the child – leadership builds self-esteem and confidence

2. Think of all the great character traits you want your child to display and model them daily.  Talk about what it means to be empathetic, responsible, gracious, a friend and so on

Mathematical Development

1. Point out numbers every where in the environment (clock, microwave, watch, television, grocery store labels, speed limit, etc…) and read the together

2. Count Cheerios at snack time to at least 20.  On some days divide snack equally by giving one to mommy and one to me until all the snack is gone.  Count backwards by eating a piece of the snack and taking a number away after each piece is gone – 10, 9, 8, 7…

3. Practice writing numbers in the air with your fingers.  Practice writing numbers on your child’s back so they feel the stroke movement with your finger.  Practice writing numbers in shaving cream on the bathtub wall.  Practice tracing numbers (largely written) that mom or dad wrote on a piece of paper.

4. Sort everything you can and in every way you can.  For example, sort the laundry by types of clothes (socks, underwear, shirts, etc…) and by colors and sizes.  Sort silverware, plastic bowls, toys, groceries and so on.  Categorizing, sorting and making patterns are critical for early math development.

Scientific Development

1. Spend a lot of time in nature investigating sights, smells, textures, tastes (when safe and appropriate).  Use science tools in nature like a magnifying glass and thermometer.

2. Ask lots of questions and try to implement experiments to see what happens.  Why is ice hard?  What do seeds grow into?

3. Allow your child to cook with you at least one day a week.  Use tools such as measuring cups and spoons and read the recipe together.

Language Development

1. Read to your child at different times during every day for at least 30 minutes total.  Reading only at bedtime teaches your child to fall asleep to stories – not exactly what you want them to do when the teacher is reading books at school.

2. Use varied vocabulary and match oral words to the actual object or a picture of the object in a book, on a flashcard or on a video/tv.  You need to speak at least 30,000 words a day to your child from birth.  Be elaborate and expect them to begin using larger vocabulary.  For example, instead of calling bugs, “bugs” – call them by their proper name – “insects.”  Use the word “vehicles” to define a group of cars, trucks, motorcycles, etc… and explain how they all fit into a group.  Also, define objects deeply and not just on the surface.  Your five year old child should know this much about apples:  it is a fruit, it grows on trees, it has seeds, it can be red, green or yellow, some are sweet and some are sour, it has skin.

3. Ask questions after events in a day or after reading a story that help your child begin to “order” events from beginning to middle to end.  This skill is critical to story comprehension and overall reading and writing success.  Talk about and create rituals (morning routine, bedtime routine) that have an order and say that order aloud as you complete the events.

4. Teach your child the letters of the alphabet by introducing their letter sound with the actual letter.  Work on learning the letters in his/her name and parents names first because they mean the most to the child.  Teach them that each letter makes a different sound and looks different.  Use ABC puzzles, books, alphabet cereal and french fries and magnetic letters to help him/her get a deeper understanding of the letters by using the senses to learn them.  Hang an alphabet chart on your wall.  Praise your child for trying to name the letter and say the sound.  Associate the letters with words that begin with that letter for long-term memory of the letters.

5. Teach your child to write his/her name and recognize (read) it.  You will begin writing the letters in the air to feel the direction of the strokes.  Then use shaving cream in the bathtub to continue the sensory use of the fingers.  You will know when your child is ready to write on paper – don’t push her too early or she will not want to write at all.

Physical Development

1. Teach your child to hop, skip, gallop, balance on one leg, button, snap, zip and use scissors

2. Use a lot of playdough and silly putty to develop the small muscles in the hands that are necessary for using scissors and writing utensils properly.

Wiggle Giggle Learn offers weekly activity plans that provide a daily activity/game/tip and educational goals  for your child’s developmental age.  For less than two dollars a week you can be your child’s first teacher and the worries of not being able to afford academic childcare/preschool will be gone forever.

Will my child be bored in kindergarten?

Question:

I have a 3.5 year old daughter.  I am a stay-at-home mom.  I have always put learning first in our home and she seems to be ahead of others her age or a little older.  Is the hard work and time I have invested in her education going to backfire when she goes to school?  Will she be bored and unchallenged?  I have friends who say they aren’t working as hard as I do because they don’t want their child to be bored.  I don’t want to think like them but I seem to be out-numbered every time this subject comes up.

Response:

Mediocre attitudes lead to mediocre lives!  You are making all of the right choices for your little girl.  Good kindergarten teachers are able to teach to an individual child’s needs and build forward on their strengths.  As a kindergarten teacher for 15 years, I cringed when parents would introduce themselves and their child to me that way.  Almost proud of doing nothing to make my life (as the teacher) easier, saying things like,  “Well… we didn’t want her to be a behavior problem and we didn’t want her to be bored in your class so we decided to limit how much we have taught her.” 

Barbaric and unbelievable, but yes… well within the norm for some parents -I see it as a “cop-out.”  They don’t know what to do so they do very little.  Enrolling their children in expensive extra-curricular activities that many times over stimulate little ones, overscheduled parents and the children and leave little time for developing the imagination, which is critical for optimal brain development. 

When the time comes and your little one goes off to school you will feel proud of your accomplishments and her love for learning.  If you believe the teacher will be appreciative of your child’s gifts and love for learning, then that is what you will receive. 

You will have a chance to meet with your child’s teacher prior to school starting.  You should share what you have been doing at home and where you think she needs more assistance.  Let the teacher know how willing you are to do extra activities at home.  Kindergarten teachers trust parents to offer lots of information that will support them in the classroom.  The transition is a difficult one for many five year olds, therefore we want to keep a certain sense of normal in their day.

Speaking for all teachers of young children, “we LOVE parents like you!”  You are providing a path for us to teach your child much more than we might have dreamed of teaching.  Kindergarten teachers like to (and, have to) teach more than the ABC’s and 123’s, buttoning, zipping, tying and washing hands. 

Today’s kindergarten is yesterday’s first grade.  Standards are higher and the No Child Left Behind act is making accountability tough.  I might suggest that your friends take a few hours to visit some kindergarten classrooms to see what kindergarten is really like. 

Good luck and bless you for your hard work!

Tracey Bryant Stuckey

Chief Creative Learning Officer

www.wigglegigglelearn.com