As a working mom who has spent a career education 9-12 year olds... the world of preschool is completely foreign to me. I remember sitting down for my first parent-teacher conference with my daughter's preschool teacher completely in awe of the work she does. And still the first words that came out of her mouth were, "I have been so nervous about this conference because you are a teacher! It's just so much more intimidating than meeting with other parents."

I actually laughed out loud. If this were my daughter's 4th grade teacher- sure- valid. I know my 4th grade stuff. But preschool? Those teachers are magic to me. 

As summer begin to quickly- okay... slowly crawl to a reality my daughter began to express a deep and sincere wish to, in her words, "get ready for kindergarten." So, admittedly, I reluctantly  began preparing for Summer Mommy Preschool because how can any teacher deny a child's request to learn more? Ha!

Preschool age kids thrive on routine and structure. With that, the first thing I did was create a visual schedule to keep my daughter in a similar structure to her Montesorri preschool. She has a strong desire to read but at the ripe age of 4 is not quite developmentally there- close- but not all there. The visual aids will help cue her in on the words that go with them and her in the loop of what our day is going to look like. 

What will our day look like? Honestly for a preschool age child during the summer mostly play! But since she has been asking  to learn how to read I wanted to incorporate some fun phonics activities. I snagged some of the resources from this page  https://www.montessorinature.com/ to start. Again, I am a 4th grade teacher at heart and will leave the teach how to read resources up to the experts lol

A lot of the resources on this page provide kinesthetic learning for my very active little girl and she seems to enjoy a lot of it. I haven't worked out specifics of an at home schedule just yet but I am thinking it will look something like:
7:30am Breakfast
8:00am Free Play 
9:00am Swim lessons, gymnastics, etc
10:00am Snack Time
10:20 Learning Cycle (aka read books, have some fun with phonics, science, social studies etc.)
12:10 Lunch
12:40 Free time, nature walks, explore and play outside
1:40 Quiet Time/ Reading/Nap time
2:40 Outdoor Play
3:30 Snack 
3:40 Quiet Time/Reading/Coloring or Outdoor play
4:20 Chores (I am a working mom and this is typically when we get home during the school day 
4:40 Screen time 
5:00 Dinner
6:00 Indoor or outdoor free play
6:30 Bath,Reading, Bedtime

Keep up with your reading over the summer and make it fun!
​Check out some of these fun titles at your local library.

​I have always found huge amounts of success behind graphic novels. 
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Below you will find some of my favorite fiction and non fiction books.