Last Updated on May 1, 2022 by Brie
Play Based Home Preschool Activities
I haven’t done a preschool post in awhile because the paper, crayons, pencils and little worksheets were not working for my three year old daughter. I had considered putting her into a formal preschool, but just couldn’t find the right one. Then I stumbled across an article on the Salty Mama’s blog about how one of the ladies put her kids through a play based preschool program. Basically, you teach lessons with toys and it’s not so structured. My daughter doesn’t do well with alot of structured things so eventually I’ll ha e to get her into a preschool program. But for right now, I’m going to continue my homeschool preschool efforts. I decided to start doing some “play based homeschool “curriculum”. Which is more of a fly by the seat of your pants, and make up activities throughout the day. If you are looking to do some educational activities with your toddler. This upcoming list will hopefully give you some great ideas.
****Each item on the list will have a subject area, and about hw long we did the activity ( which is basically my three year olds attend span for it). We will also include the supplies we used.
1.) Toy Doctor: how tall are the patients?
General Info:
- Counting/Measurements
- 15 minutes
- Legos, dolls, stuffed toys
This was such a simple activity, I just had my daughter pretend she was the doctor and was going to measure her babies with Legos. She would build the Legos as tall as her babies and then we would count them!
2.) Corral Reefs
General Info:
- Sensory, coordination, colors
- 10 minutes
- Play-doh, pipe cleaners, noodles, beads
I have seen this activity is so many photos on Pinterest that I just had to try it. But, I’m sad to admit we probably won’t be doing it again. It wasn’t a big hit with my daughter.
For this you make a Play-Doh circle as the base and poke pipe cleaners. Then I had my daughter thread noodles and beads onto the pipe cleaners. When they are full just bend them over and poke the other end of the pipe cleaners in the Play-Doh as well.
3.) Play-doh Worms
General Info:
- Science, sensory
- 10 minutes
- Play-doh, Play-Doh sicissors
This on the other hand was a huge hit with my little one. She thought it was so funny! So, she sat on the floor and rolled out a bunch of Play-Doh worms. And then I told her that if you cut a worm in half, it will still live because it can grow a new tale.
