Home"pre"schooling - Literature and the Library

I could hardly wait for Caleb to be old enough to go to story time at the library when he was small. With just one little one, it wasn't too difficult to get there.

When Hadley came along, things got more complicated of course. I had two kids to dress and strap in the car, we had to plan around Hadley's morning nap schedule, and they were a handful to tote around. In addition, one or the other (and sometimes both) of them always seemed to pick up a cold or something. If they were sick we didn't want to go and spread germs, but on the other hand, on those occasions when both of them were healthy, I sure didn't want them to pick up another illness so we hibernated. As winter passed, we came back a little more but still not as frequently as I would have liked.

As you might imagine, library visits pretty much came to a halt when Reid arrived last fall.. There was no way I wanted to bundle up three little ones against the cold, expose them to germs, and struggle to nurse Reid while helping Caleb with a craft and chasing Hadley about the room. It was just too much!

Now that the they are bigger and Caleb is in school, it has once again become doable to hit the library scene for us pretty frequently. So far, we've made a visit every week since school started.

The first week we arrived only to find out that story time had been canceled. Though it was a bit disappointing since I was excited about finally making it back, we made the best of the time. The kids loved having a new set of toys to enjoy and it gave me opportunities to talk to Hadley about the color red and the letter A which were our objectives that week. We picked up quite a few books to take home with us too - always a plus.

I found a bunch of these alphabet bags there. Each one was filled with items that started with the letter on the front.

Week two worked out much better. We got there early and had a little time to get some energy out playing before heading in to story time. Hadley, who loves songs, enjoyed the poems and nursery rhymes more than the books I believe. I liked that the theme that week - "The County Fair" - since we could make connections after having just visited the one in Shenandoah County. 

This oversized flower toy was new that week. Hadley Jayne was excited about it!

Reid was glad to have some space to roam.

The kids got musical instruments to play with as they sang together.

I wish I could get a pic of the cute setup of all the kids on the floor waiting for the librarian to read but I didn't know if other parents would want me posting kids' pics, so I took one of just Hadley. Most of the other kids seem to sit around the edges of the mat with their parents, but not my girl. She likes to get right in the middle, front and center.

After story time, there's always a craft. In keeping with the "County Fair" theme, the kids made cotton candy.

Hadley liked using her brush to spread the pink shaving cream paint all over her project.

Each month they try to do one STEM topic as well, which I think is great because math and science don't always get the attention they deserve in children's reading circles. For September they focused on positional words: up, down, beside, behind, under, etc.

Which book should I pick?

All month the library has encouraged the kids to sign up for the very own library card and to promote this effort, they used a superhero theme, including decor, contests, and prizes for signing up. I had hoped to dress Hadley up as "Word Girl" - a PBS character and her favorite superhero - to enter in their contest, but I just never could find the time to get it together. One week superheroes were even the story time topic.

Is that a funny one, Reid?

Last week, the topic was autumn. We'd already done a week long unit on seasons as a family a few weeks prior so it was good reinforcement. 

Scarecrow!

Can't forget some play time!

The barnyard was the focus for this week's story time and the kids had lots of first hand prior knowledge about this theme. Often before or after our library trips we make a little pit stop at NaNa's to visit and check out her chickens since were out and about already. Homepreschoolers need field trips too!

Aunt Courtney brought her goats over one week.

Hadley likes the chicken wagon as much as she does the animals I believe.

What's in your purse, Hadley girl?

Cheerios!

Honestly I had expected to try to go every other week, but so far our new routine is working for us. We've made it six weeks in a row! Though we picked up one cold from somewhere already, nothing major has hit us. Hopefully we'll stay healthy, this winter will be a mild one, and we'll keep up our library habit.

Going for story time isn't the only way we use the library for learning though. Every week we bring home loads of books and videos to further our literacy goals. One of the things the librarians provide that I love are the collection of "book bags" available. Along one wall, you can find quite a few canvas bags full of books preselected and grouped based on a variety of topics. 

Sometimes we choose fun topics like princesses or pirates, which are high interest and introduce a variety of vocabulary. Having several books on the same topic also provides an opportunity for making text-to text connections, one of the reading strategies we focused on a lot when I went through my Masters program to become a Reading Specialist.

Hadley has been really into princesses lately, and let me tell you, they picked AWESOME books for that topic. No typical Disney fairtales where a woman in desperation needs a man to rescue her and they live is happily ever after...Instead, they included books like Princess Palooza that focuses on how different types of girls (sporty, whimsical, or even cowgirls) can be princesses. Princesses Are Not Quitters was another cute one about princesses who decide to trade places with "the help" and learn a good lesson in how to treat others, and The Princess and the Three Knights, a Christian based take on traditional fairy tales, emphasizing selfless love and character. 

Can you guess who liked this book bag?

Aside from entertainment, these book bags can also be good for concept studies. As fall approached,their seasons bag inspired me. I thought it would be good to talk about this topic one week as part of our homepreschooling.

Even if they don't have a bag prebuilt, it isn't hard to grab a bunch on a particular topic. After our unit on seasons, I asked Caleb what he'd be interested in looking at next and he requested beetles and spiders - two types of animals he's shown a real interest in lately. The librarian helped me find a ton of books for him one day when I dropped in for a few minutes. She even offered to pull sets of books for me on various topics in advance in the future if I call ahead. Doesn't get much better than that!

I hate that Caleb is missing out on story time, but Mommy is still trying to make sure I bring home books he'd be interested in. He also requested Ninja Turtles!

After story time, they have a table set up with several other books on the topic of that day that are great to take home as well

When we they did the county fair theme I pulled several I thought Caleb could make connections to as well as another book I spotted on display as I walked through the children's section.

Finally, sometimes we get videos too. There are ones we pick up for sheer entertainment purposes, but we also have found quite a few learning ones. For example, the kids really like Leap Frog's Talking Words Factory so we found another learning one made by this same company. We also found a preschool sight word set, which I thought was incredibly boring but they kids were glued to. Whatever works, right?

I'm thankful for all the support our library has provided so far and there are so many more resources that I know we haven't explored yet. We're looking forward to checking out more of what they offer in the upcoming months as we continue on this learning journey.

Home"pre"schooling - Colors

Towards the end of August, I wrote a post about Caleb entering preschool, including all the benefits I hoped our family would reap as a result of this setup. Thankfully, things are working out as good as I hoped for - Caleb loves his school and I, in turn, have some extra time to be able to work with Hadley one-on-one while he's away and Reid is taking his morning nap. The next series of posts will give you a glimpse of some of the learning that's been happening around here for the first month of our home"pre"schooling.

One of my primary objectives for Hadley has been working on colors. Caleb knew his shapes and colors somewhere around the age of about 18 months. With Hadley though, it just never has seemed to click. I assumed that I probably worked with Caleb more since it was just the two of us back then, but I was a getting a little concerned that maybe Hadley wasn't seeing the colors correctly. Over the past month though, the later fear has been ruled out. She's really grown as we've given "identifying colors" a big emphasis during our time together.  

Hadley's had pink and blue down for a quite while. (Actually, pretty much anything pink she claims as her own. "My pink one!" she'll squeal when something catches her eye.) However, those were about the only colors she got correct consistently up until recently. I decided to start by working with one color a week, since she seemed to get confused when I'd introduce too many at the same time, and we moved on from there. At first we did red...then yellow...green...and purple!

On Monday each week, I introduced the new color and then we'd go for a color hunt. Caleb loved to be a part of this too if he was home.  He really got in to it and his enthusiasm was contagious. Hadley would be hesitant or passive at first, but when he'd start shouting and giggling over his finds, she had to join in, mimicking her big brother.

Sometimes we'd even hit the great outdoors for these types of hunts. Where better to look for the color green?

I looked for opportunities to talk about the color we were focusing on where ever I could - at the supper table, in the library, etc. We talked about the colors of our clothes, toys, pictures in books, and so much more.

I found yellow!...Hold up that corn cob!

Sesame Street is a good place to turn on occasion as well. We have some DVDs but Youtube videos were good resources too.

I signed up for ABCmouse.com several months ago and it too has been another place to look for reinforcement. Hadley liked having the computer read her books or sing songs about the colors as she watched.

We did a little paper and crayons as well...

...and, of course, we had to include some painting.

Being purposeful and repetitive has definitely paid off because Hadley knows a lot more than just two colors now. Blue, pink, purple, green, black, and white are pretty firm in her memory at this point - red and orange being somewhat consistent too. Yellow is the hang up though (which is kind of funny if you look back through these pics and see how many of them show us working with that particular color). I actually spent an extra week on this sunshiny color to help solidify it but it's just a tricky one for some reason. I'm confident she'll get it soon though...she's a smart girl. :)