February…what a great month for learning about love and indulging in sweets! We have had a great time crafting and baking to celebrate love month.
On the weekdays, my daughter and I do preschool together. It is normally short, 15-30 minutes, and really looks much more like structured play time than school. I really find that is how she learns best…accidentally. If I get a “teacher” tone with her, she can lose focus quickly. Our lessons center around a theme most of the time. That can be a letter, a number, a shape, or a holiday. We are spending this whole month on Valentines Day. We are learning about the letter V, the heart shape, and what love means. There are so many great resources out there for doing preschool at home with your kids, here is a few of our fun activities.
The HeartBreaker Game – Make 5 hearts and cut them in half. Put stickers on one half and the corresponding number on the other half. Kiddos can practice counting, number recognition, and puzzles all in one game. It is a big hit at our house!
You can also make homemade Valentines with your kids. For my 7 month old we did baby cereal bars with “I cerealously like you Valentine”.
For the preschooler, they said ” I am a sucker for you Valentine.” They were FREE from this cute site. We even included cut out lips and mustaches to add a little fun. It was a great project for us to work on together!
We could not leave cooking school out of our curriculum!
We made heart shaped sugar cookie sandwiches with marshmallow cream cheese filling and finished them off with sprinkles. Delish! My daughter loved cutting out the dough and spreading icing on each cookie. Great fun and great learning all at once!
Our lessons on love came from 1 Corinthians 13. Love is patient, love is kind, it does not boast, it is not rude… This scripture has been great for us all this month. I have used it to teach many lessons to my daughter on what it looks like to love. I found a free printable and put it on our mantle.
We also strung some hearts that we found on Christmas clearance from twine. It was a fun craft for her and it turned out pretty cute!
Here are my little Valentines!
I know for me, it can be hard to play pretend baby dolls or with trains all day. I can do so much better if we do a fun activity that everyone will enjoy and maybe learn something in the process. I hope I have inspired you to do some structured time with your preschooler.
If February seems too far gone, here are some great links to get you started for Saint Patrick’s Day!
St. Patrick’s Day Printable Pack
Happy Valentine’s Day everyone!
Wow I love this! Looks like your house is the place to be for Valentines Day! I can’t wait til I can do preschool at home with my little ones!
Great post, Jenn! Love the Heartbreaker game- we will have to do that, even after Valentine’s day!
Thanks for the St. Patrick’s stuff, too!