Our Homeschool Preschool

I finally have found what works for our homeschool preschool!! And I am so excited about it. We are following FunShine Express. I am using the Fireflies curriculum with my five and three year old, and the Buttercups curriculum with my almost 2 year old. Today, I am going to focus on the Fireflies curriculum, and here at 10:30 a.m. central, I will be live on Periscope (find me @tia5500) showing you what this time looks like for our family. If you missed it, you can follow me on twitter to see the replay.

First, I do not follow any curriculum guide word for word. I tried when I was new to homeschooling and realized that I was a slave to the curriculum guide. It just wasn’t working! Here is how I make the Fireflies curriculum work for us. At night when I am organizing the big kids school work for the next day, I look in the curriculum guide at what they have planned for the day. The guide is written to be used in a classroom so this is why I like to go through it first to see what will work for us. I highlight or circle the parts that I want to focus on the next day. One of the best parts about this curriculum is that it comes with craft kits with ALL you need to do the activities. This was a huge selling point for me. There are only so many hours in a day and by already having the supplies, I find we waste less and actually do the craft or activity! There are sometimes extra crafts in the guide that do not come with a craft kit. I skip these because we usually do several art projects together as a family throughout the week. I also use the Faith Lessons, but add to them with our flannel board and bible.
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So once I have highlighted what I want to focus on for the day, then I get all the materials out and put in their preschool bin for the next day. I use these locker bins from the Land of Nod. This keeps me accountable to get it done. I also set my phone for an alarm to go off at 10:30 a.m. which tells me to stop and do preschool work with the littles. I do not do an individual planner for the little kids like I do with my grade school children, but I do keep this weekly planner handy to write down things that I would like to accomplish this week.

My five year old daughter loves to learn and is always begging to do schoolwork. I have started the Math-U-See Primer program, Logics of English Foundations Book A, and How to Teach Your Child to Read so that I have some extra material for her. We just do these lessons as time allows. I have found that by being more lenient on my planning for preschool and having the materials out and ready to use have made preschool more feasible. And if the day does get away from me, then we can always do it tomorrow! Or before bedtime! Again, flexibility is the key. I love having a plan, but sometimes my kids have other ideas. And that is what I love about being a mom. You never know what the day may bring!!