The Eclectic Dabbler

My daughter is two years old and madly in love with her world! She is learning voraciously and talking incessantly about anything and everything new she discovers!

My background is not in education or child development.  (I was a CPA, who worked as an auditor at Ernst & Young, before becoming a stay-at-home mom at age 31.) So I would love to brainstorm with the blogging-moms community about structure, activities, and learning for the preschool child.

My 2-year-old can:

• Count to twelve by herself.
• Recognize most letters of the alphabet. (She is also learning the sounds letters make.)
• Sing the ABCs song and other simple songs like “Amazing Grace” and “Jesus Loves Me.”
• Fill in words in her oft-read books, if I pause in the story (i.e. “Corduroy is a bear who once lived in the. . . ” she will finish, “. . . toy department of a big store.”
• Recite short verses (for example, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord; for this is right. Ephesians 6:1.”)
• Look through her Bible story verse and tell you a short synopsis of each picture. (“God made light.” “God made Adam and Eve from dust.” “Noah built big boat.” “Abraham Sarah laughing–baby!”)

I don’t want to overwhelm her or push her–she is only two. But she loves to learn and she just devours everything I can teach her. Since she loves to learn letters, numbers, songs, and verses, I want to do some sort of “lesson plans,” in order to be focused in the things we are learning, rather than just randomly learning things that come up, which is basically what we are doing now.

Talk to me about:

• Preschool/toddler schedules (This is a big one for me!–how much one-on-one time with mom, playtime alone, reading time, helping time, naptime, etc.).
• Goals for preschoolers
• Activities to include daily/weekly/occasionally
• Methods of teaching/learning (and discuss how this varies between boys & girls: my son is 10 months old, so it’s not long before he’ll be a toddler too!)
• Lists of books we should check out from the library
• Childrens’ Bible verse programs you have found helpful
• Bible story books/visuals that seem consistent with the Scriptural text
• Also a discussion on early music training (she loves to sing and “play the piano” with me–I teach piano, and as a child, I started taking lessons at age seven, but I’m interested in a discussion of the pros and cons of starting music earlier.)

I’m all ears!

I would soo love to read dozens of blog posts on this topic tomorrow! So pleeeeze reply in the comments or link to your own blog! Thank you!

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