The Curriculum

I did a lot of searching online for a preschool curriculum that I felt would best suit Caleb and his learning styles. My main requirement was that it be something fun that involved lots of hands on learning. I believe, at any age, learning should be fun. You are more likely to retain knowledge when you have fun in the process of learning.

In my searching, I ended up stumbling across the ABC Jesus Loves Me website. I was immediately impressed with how the curriculum was laid out and most of all with the fact that it is Bible based. I had my mom, a retired elementary school teacher, check out the curriculum as well. As soon as it got her stamp of approval, I knew that I had found the right one. The curriculum is completely free, but I decided to pay to have the curriculum sent to me in book form so I could refer to it without having to go online all the time.

The curriculum is broken down into 36 weeks. Each weekly lesson plan covers a Bible story, memory verse, song, a nursery rhyme or poem, a number, a book of the week, a letter, a color/math concept, fine motor skills, and gross motor skills. After reading over the curriculum many times, I decided to mostly follow what was laid out, but to change it a bit to suit how I know Caleb will learn best.

Currently, the 3-year-old curriculum has a book of the week based on the phonetic sound of the letter of the week. Per my mom's advice, and knowing Caleb, I will not be as much focusing on phonics this year, but instead focusing on letter recognition first and foremost. If, during the year, I see that Caleb is showing signs of being ready for phonics, I will start  incorporating that, too. Because of this, I have decided to change the books of the week to fit within a thematic unit and am then going to be choosing activities that will help enforce the other parts of that week's lesson plan within that theme. So while I will still be using many of the ideas and concepts that are part of the ABC Jesus Loves Me, I have completely restructured it to incorporate thematic units.

For instance, the curriculum has the first several weeks learning three colors each week and then later learning 2 shapes each week. I know how easily Caleb can get overwhelmed, so I have chosen to focus on just one color and then one shape each week. I think he will be more likely to retain the information if I take it slower. I have then chosen books and themes for each week that will incorporate those colors/shapes. For example, the week we learn the color yellow we will be doing a duck themed lesson plan and the week we learn red it will be an apple theme.

I currently have planned out the first 12 weeks lesson plans and am still working on the remaining weeks. I still need a few more ideas of possible themes for some weeks. I am really enjoying looking at other homeschool blogs to get ideas of activities to go along with the themes I have chosen. Check out the following blogs I have found that have some really awesome ideas:

Baby Gator University
1+1+1=1
Homeschool Creations
Delightful Learning
I Can Teach My Child!
Lawteedah

I will make sure that as I post about activities that we do that I got from other sites I will give credit where credit is due. :)