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2 1/2 year old -- Where to start?


Halie
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Hello everyone,

 

My daughter is 2 1/2, and I am really having trouble figuring out where to start with her. What were y'all doing with your toddlers at this age? What was a normal day like? What learning tools did you use? Any advice would be oh so appreciated. 

 

Thank you,

Halie

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Soo...I have a 2.5 year old and we just recently started anything at all. 

 

I've just started sitting with him first thing in the morning. We get the tablet or the computer, and we play on brainpop jr and Starfall. We're working on the less obvious colors, on counting, and shapes. Then we'll move on to the letters of the alphabet. When I feel like we've been over what I wanted to do, but he still wants to play, I leave him to it. If he says "all done" and slides off my lap, we're all done. 

 

Then he plays while I help DD finish her school. Then they play outside. Then he takes a nap. Then he plays some more. Some days we do something that involves coloring or cutting or making muffins. Then it's usually time for one of sister's sports, where he plays. Then we have dinner, read several books, and go to bed.  :laugh:

 

He has second child syndrome for sure. DD knew all her colors and shapes and numbers by now, but even with her, I think she was three before I introduced anything more than Starfall and books. At that point I was finding printable units based on the Before Five in a Row books and doing them with her. Coloring and matching and sorting and letters and numbers. She loved them. We didn't start any "real" curricula until she was 4 and even then I knew we were a year early - we did Kindergarten at that point.  

 

 

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My girls learned their letters around that age.  It was a no-pressure fun flashcard game.  I taught them the *sounds* of the letters, not the letter names, and many people think this is important.  

 

The only other thing I did at that age was read lots of picture books and board books.  

 

There are lots of pre-academic skills that are really important for brain development.  Balance (playground equipment, playing in natural spaces with uneven ground surface, etc.), hand strength (play dough, sand box, etc.), but the most important thing you can do for your 2.5 year old is to make sure you are teaching the habit of following your directions!  Of course this is a slow process, but it starts now.  Obedience is a habit learned over years, and it will make your life so much easier when they are 4-6 years old and ready for K!  

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Nothing formal. We read books. I introduce new vocabulary whenever the opportunity arises...i.e. He says, "It's windy" and I respond, "Yes, ooh, I just felt a big gust of wind. Did you feel that gust?" I also correct oral usage and have him repeat it back correctly. I point out letters and numbers. Play-doh, crayons, and lots of scrap paper are always available.

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At 2.5, we focused a lot on basic skills.  I read stories, we did art, went to the park, did puzzles, incorporated some basic Montessori things...like, I took a Cool Whip tub, cut a wide slot in the top, and gave him a stack of large coins.  He had fun putting them in the tub (strengthening that pincer grasp), removing the lid, and taking them back out again.  We did gradient puzzles, where each piece was slightly different than the others, either wider or taller or a different shade.  I introduced letter sounds with tactile letters, one at a time, having the basket ready whenever he wanted to play.  We used a spindle box to teach quantity/number symbols.  We did a lot of things like learning how to put on clothes, open and close latches, pour, drink, cut..a lot of playdough time, too, and exploring our world.

 

I believe the very foundations of academics are rooted in basic skills.  I had no desire to introduce pseudo-academics (no memorization of letter names, rote counting, etc), but follow his lead and introduce things that a) could be reintroduced if he wasn't ready and b) could become their own stepping stone to later work.

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We go hiking on nature trails as often as possible, usually every day. We like 20th Century Children’s Book Treasury, Harper Collins Treasury of Picture Book Classics, Wee Sing Nursery Rhymes, Cuisenaire Rods (huge recommendation!), Classical Conversations Timeline Song (Christian), Geopuzzles (everyone should own this, my son’s political geography knowledge is beyond that of most adults), Magic School Bus (available on YouTube), Salsa from Georgia Public Broadcasting, Art For Kids Hub (free), Lincoln Logs, Magnatiles (they have played with these everyday for over two year), Wooden train tracks, and Playsilk.

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People might disagree, but I'd focus a lot on developmental milestones. Gross motor, fine motor, speech, language, and problem solving.  Look at typical standards, and find activities to encourage those domains. Strong fine motor skills are needed for later writing, speech/language skills for reading/literacy/phonics, gross motor for health and self-regulation, and problem solving for later cognition. Obviously not all kids hit all milestones at the same time, but noting where your child is struggling and working on those areas can really help later development. 

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Fingerplays, nursery rhymes, board books & picture books, singing, and talking about daily life are all great for language skills.  Gross & fine motor skill activities like playdough, painting, coloring, puzzles, pushing & pulling things, rolling/throwing a ball, etc. are important too.  My DS loves "nature walks" around the yard where he can pick up pine cones & sticks.  

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We read so many books. Seriously, hours and and hours of books. Lots of time outside (hikes, playgrounds, wanderings). I miss that age because everything can be an adventure. 

 

For the sake of my own organization, and because I was so excited to start teaching my children, I would organize our activities around bi-weekly themes. They were seasonally organized, so, for example, we'd study plants in March. It was all very open-ended and process of discovery type stuff. For example, we planted all kinds of stuff from our kitchen to see what would grow. It was fun for me, too :)

 

I don't know if I'd change much from those early days with my first kiddos, but if I did I might add more Montessori type activities to our day, specifically those that are geared toward personal care (buttons, shoes, laundry folding) and housekeeping (sweeping skills). 

 

Just remember that your child has learned **so much** without your explicit help: how to speak, how to walk, how to emote and relate to others. We are hard wired to learn. Absent learning issues, your child will learn all that she needs to know to in her preschool years simply by living in an engaged, caring household.

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At 2.5 I have them start on the first Kumon books like cutting, pasting and coloring. I get sticker books. Around 3 they start Core Knowledge Preschool Activity Books. Check out Timberdoodle.com for lots of ideas on fun things to add. We read a ton. Simple art stuff. Check out WeeFolkArt.com for some fun ideas, I'm considering it but haven't used it yet. Simple science stuff like mixing food dye in water and changing the colors. There are a bunch of science type kits like Clifford. I never managed to use Before Five in a Row with my oldest but I'm going to try to actually use it with my youngest. Basically add on and do stuff with the books we read. I try to follow their interests. My oldest loved to sit and read but my youngest doesn't like to sit still for too long. Have fun!

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We're going for exposure to a variety of topics. DS already knows letters, numbers, shapes, etc, so we're doing very loose units. I pick a topic, we read about it in fiction and nonfiction books, then we explore by taking field trips, doing crafts, songs, sensory and pretend play.

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I don't do anything formal at that age. We read a lot of books, good quality books. I narrate what I'm doing. We go for walks and talk about what we see. We go hiking regularly. I let my little ones play hard outside without me being three steps behind them at the playground. We sing a lot of songs together. I let my kids help in the kitchen.

 

I provide materials for drawing, play dough, etc. but again don't do anything formal. Only my oldest had much interest in drawing at that age, my other two were closer to 4 before they had an interest in drawing.

 

My third child is nearly 4, I'm still not planning to do anything formal with him until he's 5/6.

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  • 2 weeks later...

When my oldest was about 18 months I bought one of the Leap Frog letter magnet sets where kids can put in a letter and it says the letter name and the sound. Around age 2 I bought her a pack of foam letters that stick to the wall of the bathtub when they are wet. The letter magnets live on the dishwasher (they'd been on the fridge, but it made cooking dinner hard if someone was playing while I was cooking) so that the kids can play with them whenever and we can talk about them if they have questions or want to play "find the letter" while I'm cooking. All 3 of my kids have known their letters and letter sounds by age 3 just from the exposure, no formal lessons. Colors and shapes are taught as they come up. Things like asking if they want the blue shirt or the orange shirt or a triangle or a rectangle block. I feel like it is more important to let them focus on open-ended play and make sure you have things like play dough and art supplies available than it is to do a formal curriculum at that age. We start a little bit of formal work around kindergarten age for the 3Rs and I start adding more books about science, history , and grammar to our read alouds. My oldest is 6.5 and we are still pretty informal, but every time I panic about how little formal work we do and print out the state standards as a reference she is doing just fine.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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  • 4 weeks later...

We started Teach Your Child to Read in 100 easy lessons and Right Start Math A around this time. Our daughter already knew all of her letters and sounds and we decided to just try 100 easy lessons with her. There is a good chunk of 100 easy lessons dedicated to teaching letter sounds though, so the early lessons were really easy for her and she learned and enjoyed the format. We only did lessons if she wanted to, but she generally wanted to. We would usually average about 3 days per week where we would do school time (sometimes more and sometimes less or not at all). School time is usually around an hour long for reading + math and sometimes we also talk about science/history suggested in the Pre-k core knowledge what your child should know book (what do plants need/ types of animals / George Washington / pilgrims and native americans). 

 

She finished 100 easy lessons in 8 or 9 months and now she's addicted to Bob Books. She's so proud of herself and so excited that she can read that she'll want to continue on well past the 1 or 2 books we actually plan on reading for lessons. She's at 3.5 now and we are working on handwriting without tears to get her writing well enough to do explode the code. 

 

She of course does all of the normal toddler stuff. She loves singing songs, going to parks, playing with her friends, painting (she's been really into water colors lately), puzzles, blocks, toys, playing/watching on her tablet (kids kindle fire), making necklaces with beads, legos, etc. 

 

As for materials, we have a school room that has a bookshelf with the books around her level, a small round kids table with kid chairs that she can sit at to read/write, a dry erase board on the wall (She was really into having us print the stories from the end of the end of each lesson in 100 easy lessons on the board and reading it from there instead of from the book). She also has some miscellaneous toys in her school room separate from her normal toys (a block/bead set with some shoestrings that we originally used for talking about patterns and for helping her develop motor skills as well as some kids board games/memory tile games). 

 

We're fortunate in that she really loves her school time. She loves learning to write new letters (she does the copywork in HWT and then we make her a page with a sentence or two of copy work focusing on the letter(s) she recently learned). She loves reading. She loves her work in Right Start, especially when she gets to use the abacus. If she didn't actively want to do this stuff, we wouldn't be doing it and would have just gotten to it later. Our son is 15 months and doesn't show any interest in sitting still long enough to be read to (other than bedtime) like his sister was at that age. I don't know if he'll be interested to start learning to read or do other school type stuff at 2.5 or not. If not, no big deal. 2 year olds still learn an awful lot just by living and all that other stuff can come later. 

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Read aloud

Potty training

Washing hands

Sing toddler songs

Walking without whining

Blow dandelions

Asking for help instead of whining or screeching

Answer the same questions over and over

Affirm endlessly about who is a boy and who is a girl

Read aloud

Clear plate from the table

Put away toys when done playing

Nursery Rhymes

Talk about what we are doing

Count all the things

Coloring

Read aloud

Accept when Mom or Dad says 'no' without whining

Peg board stacking

Magnets

Sort by colors

No whining about food or when the next meal is

Read aloud

Pump on the swing

Skipping/Galloping/Marching/Spinning

Picking strawberries/blueberries

Read aloud

Help cook

Learn how to clean up own spills/messes

Put on own shoes and clothes

Feed themselves

Practice washing themselves

Practice brushing own teeth

Sing songs

Remember what we did today

Listen to them tell the same story/joke over and over and over

Read aloud

Say please and thank you

Balls

Blocks

Puzzles

Read aloud

Play in water

Play in sand

Dig in dirt

Blow bubbles

Sidewalk chalk

Read aloud

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At that age, we didn't actively try to learn anything!  I read to them a lot, they played, we played.  I was into crafts like clay and finger painting and playing in the sand.  They probably spent the majority of their free time playing "people."  Little plastic 2-inch high characters (people and animals) with little houses, some Fischer Price, but other generic ones too.  That was absolutely their favorite thing to do.  They did lots and lots of imaginative play at that age.

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  • 1 month later...

Sensory bin play is great homegrown preschooler has many good play ideas

Letter sounds if she is interested 1plus1plus1 blog has many good printables for 1 inexpensive download or free if you gind them esch individually http://m.1plus1plus1equals1.net/qnvuw6s/articles/56218/Tot-School-Printables-A-to-Z-Bundle-

Also just the teachers book and cards from AAR pre1 are great for reading readiness (you can call them to get just the cards and find teacher book used. Add your own alphabet book and children's poems.

 

Preschool math at home looks great but I haven't personally used it

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