Porter Preschool has BEGUN!

So every since I opened my daycare in 2007, I have had this GOAL and DREAM to do a preschool program with the kids, that has been a long time in the works. I started with having POSTERS hanging all over my living room, and later decided that my personal life was being invaded by my daycare life. So I had to go back to square one. At the time, none of my kids were old enough for the workbooks that I had bought for them to work in, and so I had to take another step back. During this last Summer, I had decided I was going to get things in to motion. I was going to take advantage of the good ideas I had, and see what I could do to work with them. And then a lot of bad things came my way that caused me to have to put my plans in motion. I had gone through the loss of my grandma, which was a very sudden loss, and went through some additional loss in other areas of my life. And it put me in to a funk. I had no more desire to research options for my preschool program and the truth is, I would read stories here and there, we would color, and for the month of December we watched preschool based television programs, but the more the time passed, and days went by, I knew I needed to kick myself back in to gear. And so I started getting really in to looking for websites that offered preschool ideas, getting a more clear understanding of what I needed to do to start a program, and where I needed to start. I focused on how I was going to make it age appropriate for each kid, and how I was going to tailor their learning to each of them. I got excited again. And I started conversing with a friend of mine who had kids roughly the same age who was looking in to starting a program with them as well. And together, we formed some pretty good directions to head.

Then, she gave me an idea of a way that I could have amazing preschool displays, while not having to have my house decorated like a classroom. I was able to create preschool boards, using the display boards for presentations, and came up with some starting points for how I was going to do them. I would have one board for the 2's and 3's, and another board for the 4 year old (my son) that would help keep him encouraged to keep learning. I enlisted to help of the greatest dad in the world, who was able to laminate my projects for me to add to my boards. I also found supplies from things I already had around the house. All I had to buy was some Velcro, rubber cement, crazy glue, and paper fasteners. And low and behold, I had a direction!


I knew one of the big things I needed to start with when it came to the two year olds, was working on shapes. So I found some basic shapes, and added Velcro to the back's of them. I wrote underneath each one what shape was supposed to go where (of course, reading is not going to come until much later, but the basic recognition of the word was what I was going for here) and could remove them and ask the kids what shape is what, and show them where it goes.
I also knew that directions is a big thing to start with the kids. Ethan is a VERY directional kid, he picked up very early his ups, downs, lefts and rights, and so I knew that was something I definitely wanted to work on with the kids. So I have two arrows, and four directions, and I'll work with the kids on which way is up, down, left and right.

I was finally able to find some time and space to get everything spread out, and start to get my visions up and running. I spent an entire Sunday gluing, spacing, Velcro-ing, and getting ready. It was a very fun and productive time for me and I really felt like I was on the track to where I wanted to be heading with this next step in our daycare.
And of course, no preschool display board is complete without a farm! This was my last, and most fun idea. We can do matching, we can work on animals and sounds, and sing songs and play games relating to animals with this simple addition. I really loved how this turned out.
And of course, we will have alphabet and numbers to work on. It's all very exciting. Here is the final look of what our very first preschool board looks like. Still a lot of space to add, and to make changes when we need to, but it's a start, and I'm so excited to see where it goes!



Then comes Ethan's board. A fun challenge for me, as he is in a preschool already, and I wanted to work with him on things that they weren't already working on in class (since we already do his "homework" with him in that area). I wanted to find the things that I really saw him needing to work on, and the things that sparked his interest. So I came up with a fun board that will not only allow him to start learning a bunch of fun things, but will be able to be used for the younger kids as they excel in their areas. Learning days of the week, months of the year, telling time, learning about seasons, and the difference between day and night. Also focusing on the weather, and allowing Ethan to look outside and know what the weather is like by how the sky looks. This was very fun for me because I was able to create pictures with hands that turned, and of course have a lot of Velcro items for him to be hands on with. I also plan on working a lot with the "yesterdays, todays, tonights and tomorrows". Here are some photos of what his board is going to look like. It's not completely finished, but I still have time to get his program up and running! I will also do workbook learning with him, letter writing, name writing, and things like that.



How amazing to see all of this coming together. I'm so excited to see where this takes us, as well as see the kids start to develop more and more each day!