Since this is only our second year homeschooling, I can honestly say that it has been an adventure for all of us. All three girls are at different stages: 4th grade, 1st grade, and Preschool. My focus has mainly been on my two older girls, but I have been trying to incorporate preschool learning for my 3.5 year old. As an early childhood educator, I feel this area of learning is very important. I am very excited to have come across Flowering Baby. My sweet preschooler and I utilized two learning CD programs: Volume 4: Three to Four Years and Volume 5: Four to Five Years.
Flowering Baby Three to Four Years program is pretty straight forward and is broken into two parts which I feel is ideal for this age group.
General Guide
- Math
- Language
- Physical
- Self-Help
- Holidays
- Seasons
- Animals
- Sports
I like how this program incorporates foreign language (Spanish) into the mix with counting, etc
Basically, you just put the CD into your computer. The files pop up and presto! Your daily lesson plans are right there at your finger tips. All you have to do is plan for your materials such as art supplies, books, etc. and for each month of the year.
Here is an example of a typical day using Flowering Baby Three to Four Program:
Day 1
ABC‟s: Sing the ABC song. Select three sequence card sets and ask him to put the cards in the proper sequence. (This is my preschooler's favorite)
Math: Count out loud from 1 to 5, have your child count along with you. Repeat.
New Year‟s: Discuss the New Year. Talk about the calendar, months, and seasons. Explain and tell your child what year it is and what year is was yesterday.
Blue: Read book. Dress all in blue for the day. Color a picture only using shades of blue.
Triangles: Using maksing tape, make a large triangle on the floor. Walk on the lines and discuss triangles-they have three equal sides and three corners. Name things that are shaped like a triangle (piece of pizza, wedge of watermelon, piece of toast cut in half, or a Christmas tree).
I also enjoyed supplementing and adding fun activities to the general guide above. Here is a typical "themed" day:
Day 1:
"Look at a globe and discuss the arctic relative to where you live. Read a book about the arctic/aquarium. Gather toy aquarium/arctic animals, or you can cut photos out of a magazine or draw them on construction paper. Have your child name each animal he knows, and then discuss the ones he was not able to name. Have your child sort the animals depending on if they live on the land or in the water, or both. Lastly, count the animals you have gathered."
My little sweet pea got to utilize our new globe that I purchased for our homeschool. She feels like such a big girl. It is fun having her try to say big words such as "aquarium" and "arctic". And cutting, oh yes, preschoolers love cutting.
The Three to Four Years program is priced at $38.00.
To take it up a notch, I also utilized some of the Volume 5: Four to Five Years program to see if she was ready for more of a challenge. This program is in the same format as the Three to Fours program, but with more skills. Here is what Day 1 looks like in Volume 5:
ABC‟s: Sing the ABC song. Practice writing A, a. Look for items that start with the letter "a."
Math: Practice writing numbers 0, 1, 2, 3. Count from 1 to 10.
New Year‟s: Discuss the New Year. Tell your child what year it is and what year it was. Talk about the calendar, months, and seasons.
Blue: Read book. Dress all in blue for the day. Play "I spy" something blue around your house. Color a picture only using shades of blue crayons.
Triangles: Using masking or painter's tape, make a large triangle on the floor. Walk on it and discuss triangels-they have three sides and three corners. Name things that are shaped like a triangle (piece of pizza, wedge of watermelon, or a piece of toast cut in half).
Spanish: Let your child look at the book on their own and get familiar with the contents.
If you compare the differences you see the development is geared for the specific age group or wherever your child is in their development. My 3.5 year old can count and point to 20 on her own and is tracing numbers and letters so this was very helpful. She is still learning her letters and sounds so both Volumes are very helpful in that aspect.
The themes are also similar. I like how we are also free to be flexible and add and take away whatever we need in order to suit the needs of the child. This is very important in my opinion. I anticipate using the Four to Five Years program more often in the days ahead for Kindergarten readiness. So fun!
The Four to Five Years program is also priced at $38.00.
Flowering Baby is currently offering a 10% discount to my readers. Just add the code "Blog10" when ordering. This is good for the website: www.FloweringBaby.com only.
I want to personally thank Martha Saunders, creator of Flowering Baby, for allowing me to utilize this program with my preschooler. It has been a joy. I look forward to continuing with the program in the days ahead. And thank you to Carolyn Schulte for providing this program with your expertise on the young child.
I did have a couple pics of my preschooler doing a couple of the activities to share here in my review, but my camera phone went hay-wire and all my photos have disappeared. So bummed. If I can recover those images, I will post them in a separate post.
Feel free to check out all the products over at Flowering Baby and visit the Review Crew page here, or click banner below to read more reviews.
Disclaimer: As a member of the TOS Crew, I received this product, at no cost to me, in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are mine.
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