The Bartlett Family Blog
  • About Us
  • Blog

Some big (exciting) changes are coming- TOT SCHOOL!!

10/26/2011

1 Comment

 
I have decided to start "home school" with Riley.  Now before you jump to any conclusions (like I used to do when I heard the words "home school," hear me out.  It's actually pretty cool.  First of all, Riley is only 16 months old, so pretty much everything will be play-based.  It's not like we're sitting here drilling her on ABC's and filling out workbooks.  Yeah right.  Basically it's just playing with her, guided by a theme each month (which I will choose). I might change it to two themes a month if we run out of activities or if she loses interest, we'll see.  It's really all going to depend on Riley and what she's interested in at the moment.

SO... we started a little (or very) late this month, but for what's left of it, our theme is "Halloween".  Here's just a little peak into what we're doing with our Halloween theme.  I started by clearing all the junk out of Riley's toy shelf, and replacing it with things I picked to go with the theme, as well as some of her favorite non-Halloween related toys.  Here's what her shelf looks like when she wakes up in the morning:
octoberschool
Quick summary: (1) picture cards (2) puzzle (3) stacking blocks (4) shape sorter truck (5) home made straw container toy (6) block of fun (7) orange balloons (8) geometric stacker (9) orange items (10) Halloween treasure bowl (11) white and black items (12) Halloween (and regular) books.
I basically took a ton of her toys out and put them away.  She had so many toys out, that her "playing" really just involved taking them all off the shelf and making a huge mess, but not really PLAYING with much of anything.  Some things I left are obviously not Halloween-themed, and I left them because (a) she loves them and (b) they are good toys for learning.  Things like the puzzles, the stacking blocks, the truck shape sorter, and the geometric stacker. Oh and her beloved flash cards.  Those will probably stay out for quite a while.

Now for the fun stuff.  HALLOWEEN THEME!!
BOOKS:  All centered around Halloween.  Riley usually prefers to read the same old books over and over, so I wasn't sure what she'd think about these, but she actually liked most of them!  Here's what we got (from the limited selection at the library this close to Halloween) Normally I would get more, but there's only a few days left in the month, so I only got 6:
octoberbooks
Surprisingly she likes all of them, except the "One Witch" one, she's not really into it. Normally she takes a while to warm up to new books, but she let me read all of these with her!

SONGS:  I'll be honest, I didn't know a single Halloween song.  But thanks to the lovely internet, I now have quite a few.  Best part?  The ones I learned are basically just new lyrics to common tunes, so pretty easy.  And since she knows the tune, she likes the songs!

POEMS:  I have a bunch of Halloween poems/rhymes to read to Riley.  She's generally not really that interested in poems and nursery rhymes, but I want to get into the habit of reading her rhymes and it's a pretty easy thing to do, so we'll see how it goes.  Reading nursery rhymes and poems to your kids is great for language development, so in the future I'll share some of what Riley likes just in case anybody is interested.  She likes them a lot better if they have some sort of action to go along with them.  Here's an example (you can use your fingers as the "pumpkins":
c-poem
ACTIVITIES:  This was a little bit tricky, but also really fun to try and come up with things to fit the theme.  What Halloween "activities" could we do?  Here's what I came up with:

(1) Halloween "treasure basket."  This is meant to be a Halloween themed sensory basket, so lots of things that are fun and different to touch- includes leaves, spider web, Halloween erasers, ribbon, spiders, tomb filled with confetti, mini pumpkin pencil toppers, rubber skeleton, a random pine cone or two... She LOVED the spider web, and loved trying to get all the spiders out of it.
octobertreasurebox
(2) Halloween color sorting- I already had an orange and a white trick-or-treat bucket, so we went with that and filled each bucket with its respective colored items.  I didn't want to spend any money, so I searched the house and found everything I could that fit the color theme, and stuck it in the basket.  So we're clearly working on orange, black, and white.
octobercolors
(3) pumpkin seed sensory bowl- we're going to try playing with pumpkin seeds this weekend at our pumpkin carving party, and see how that goes.  I think this time I'll give her some different sized cups or bowls and some spoons and see what she does with it.  Maybe a water bowl as well so she can drop the seeds in there if she wants? 
(4) Making pumpkin bread from scratch- this is our activity tomorrow morning after breakfast!  We're going to make pumpkin bread and she gets to help measure, pour, stir, and then do the dishes with me!  And of course EAT the deliciousness!!

(5) Orange balloons!  Good for learning colors, and for comparing sizes (4 different sized balloons), but mostly just good for throwing and kicking and shouting "boons boons boons" over and over again!  Also, very good for covering with stickers!  (please excuse the pants-less baby, it was almost bath time).
octoberballoons
OUTINGS PLANNED
(1) Halloween Day at the zoo- SO excited for this one, we're going on Saturday!
(2) Trick-or-treating!  There's an awesome neighborhood by our apartment that has great decorations and lights and is super kid friendly, so I can't wait to check it out with Riley.
(3) Halloween children's parade on Monday- hurray for another excuse to put on her Halloween costume!
(4) San Jose Children's Museum- tomorrow with Grandma (not Halloween related I don't think...)
(5) We carved pumpkins once already, and we'll be doing it again at a pumpkin carving party on Sunday!
Now just because we pick a theme doesn't mean we don't do other "normal" stuff.  We do.  In fact, Riley's favorite thing that I just made for her?  Totally not Halloween related at all.  And total cost? $0.  I took a container of puffs, cleaned it out, and filled it with straws that we already had.  Minimal effort, literally HOURS of fun for her.  She takes the straws out, puts them back in.  Piles them up, carries them around, chews on them, blows through them, the list goes on...
octobertoys
Sooo that pretty much sums up our Halloween theme work!!  I'm loving having an excuse to do some new and creative things with Riley, and she seems to really be enjoying it too.  Next month we will probably have two themes I think- first "transportation" (think cars, trains, trucks, planes, bikes, etc) and "Thanksgiving," although I think the Thanksgiving theme may really revolve around turkeys, as I don't think pilgrims and such will be all that exciting for her, but who knows.  Maybe Indians?  I don't know yet, we'll see.

Also?  Riley turned 16 MONTHS OLD today, so stay tuned for 16 month update coming tomorrow.
1 Comment
WeeMason's Mom link
10/28/2011 01:19:10 am

Oh my gosh, I love love love this idea!! We have been doing the "checked out a bunch of Halloween books" and "visited Halloween related places" but I love love love the other ideas you have for activities and I'm totally going to steal a bunch of them, starting with Googling Halloween rhymes and songs.

Please keep posting about your ideas, I'm eager to hear ALL about them and would love to follow along with Mason!

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Check out
    Melissa Bartlett Photography

    Picture

    RSS Feed

    Archives

    January 2018
    April 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    December 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    June 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010
    January 2010
    December 2009
    November 2009
    October 2009
    September 2009
    August 2009
    July 2009
    June 2009
    May 2009
    April 2009

    Categories

    All
    10 Months
    11 Months
    12 Months
    14 Months
    15 Months
    16 Months
    17 Months
    18 Months
    1st Trimester
    2nd Trimester
    2 Under 2
    2 Year Old
    3 Months
    3rd Trimester
    3 Year Old
    4 Months
    5 Months
    6 Months
    7 Months
    8 Months
    9 Months
    Allergies
    Babies
    Baby Riley
    Baby Sign
    Birthday
    Birth Story
    Breastfeeding
    Chemistry
    Cole
    Discipline
    Exercise
    Family
    First Birthday
    First Trimester
    Health
    Holidays
    Homeschool
    Iphoneography
    Jackson
    Job
    Landscaping
    Mark
    Milestones
    Monthdays
    Moving
    Newborn
    New House
    New Toy Tuesday
    November School
    Nursery
    October School
    One Year
    Our House
    P365
    Photobooth
    Photo Booth
    Photo Challenges
    Photography
    Photograpy
    Potty Training
    Pregnancy
    Pregnancy #2
    Preschool
    Project 365
    Riley
    Riley's First Birthday
    Scrapbooks
    Siblings
    Sleep
    Sleeping
    Soccer
    Solids
    Speech Therapy
    Swimming
    Tantrums
    Tot School
    Vacation
    Vacations
    Videos
    Vlogs
    Wedding

Proudly powered by Weebly