Thursday, August 5, 2010

Schooling with Baby

I'm searching for ideas on what baby will do while we school. I don't like waiting 'till he's napping to start school, but that is when the most productive work is done. I've thought about having one of the older kids play with him while one-on-one time is happening with the other student, but we haven't actually tried that yet. This week I made time to have training time--training the big kids how to do this, (ie. not say they are playing with the baby and get distracted to do their own thing.) I think that will be a helpful approach sometimes. I cleared out a corner for baby toys to be near our school area so he can be steered in that direction if they both need to be with me for corporate learning times like history or science. We also tried play dough with him this week, although I had reservations. He is now 15 months old and he did very well. The big kids played with him, and my daughter got caught up in playing with it herself. Since he didn't ingest or throw much of the play dough at all I thought it was a very good first experience.
I am excited to embrace the teachable moments, from showing the kids how to help with younger ones, to giving him the example of bigger kids helping him, and him learning to help too. I am so excited about this year. I know it will be busy but great!
So baby's "curriculum" will consist of lots of tactile, sensory activities with big kids or with all of us while other schooling is happening. I've got a drawer started with ideas and activities for him. He will hear us read aloud, and see us working together to keep the home. I'll be collecting links to resources for this tremendous time of early learning and I'll try to remember to enjoy his cute, funny interruptions for this all too brief stage of life!
A link I just found that will be visited often: Nurturing the Tender Years great ideas for activities with littles!

1 comment:

Mommy Reg said...

1+1+1=1 has tons of great ideas for baby activities. It's always a challenge to school with baby when they stop sleeping all day long. Way to go with the playdough. :) I am always timid to try playdough that young.