How I plan homeschool for my preschoolers. Some tips and considerations to think about when planning a great preschool day at home.
*In a hurry? Pin this article to reference later!
If you want a look into our personal homeschool preschool schedule, you will find that here.
Laying a foundation for formal school
The Aim of Education
“Our aim in Education is to give a Full Life.––We begin to see what we want. Children make large demands upon us. We owe it to them to initiate an immense number of interests.
Thou hast set my feet in a large room; should be the glad cry of every intelligent soul. Life should be all living, and not merely a tedious passing of time; not all doing or all feeling or all thinking––the strain would be too great––but, all living; that is to say, we should be in touch wherever we go, whatever we hear, whatever we see, with some manner of vital interest.
We cannot give the children these interests; we prefer that they should never say they have learned botany or conchology, geology or astronomy. The question is not,––how much does the youth know? when he has finished his education––but how much does he care? and about how many orders of things does he care? In fact, how large is the room in which he finds his feet set? and, therefore, how full is the life he has before him?”
-Charlotte Mason, (Vol. 3, p. 170-171)
I love how Charlotte Mason describes the aim of education in this text.
Likewise, the aim of classical education is to cultivate a life of godly virtue and develop character.
Keeping the end vision in mind is essential when planning our days and directing our steps in homeschooling. This vision is just as vital in the earliest years of a child’s life as it is once they begin formal school lessons.
Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, and a life
Charlotte Mason said that education is an atmosphere, a discipline, and a life.
Each of these areas are important for building out an education of delightful, lifelong learning, beginning in the early years.
Planning the Day for Preschoolers
When planning out the flow of our day, I keep the three pillars and principles (atmosphere, discipline, life) in mind for my preschooler’s day.
These principles applied in the early years will help set up my preschooler for the later formal years of education.
Though it does not look like bookwork and filling out worksheets, the education of my preschooler in these years runs much deeper in character development.
Atmosphere
The atmosphere of a home is more than material items found in the home.
The mother is the curriculum
In classical education, as well as Charlotte Mason’s philosophy of education, there is a large emphasis on the mother being the curriculum.
The demeanor, habits, and way that a mother carries herself largely impact the atmosphere in which the child is being educated by.
This is convicting and important to keep in mind as we grow in character as mothers, recognizing the role God has placed us in within our homes.
Guide, philosopher, and friend
“Mothers are philosophers, teachers, entrepreneurs and feast-givers.” – G.K. Chesterton
“The teacher who allows his scholars the freedom of the city of books is at liberty to be their guide, philosopher and friend; and is no longer the mere instrument of forcible intellectual feeding.” Pg 32, Philosophy of Education by Charlotte Mason (Vol. 6)
As a mother teacher, we are to be a guide, philosopher, and friend, partnering with our children on the journey of education.
Recognizing that we are a prime example to our child in living an ordered life and laying the feast for their education is a vital role that cannot be taken lightly, but with humility and prayer.
We have everything we need to do this well with God’s help. Taking some time to reflect on this thought can be beneficial to our days as homeschool moms.
Family culture
Family culture also plays a large role in the atmosphere of the home.
What are the important things to your family? Actions speak louder than our words. What do your actions say are important to you and worth loving?
It is important to look at the things we repeatedly do as a family. These actions contribute to our family culture, whether we recognize them or not.
For example, if it is important to you that your child loves to learn and to read great literature, is that something they see you value in your home? Is reading a part of your daily life? Is your home full of worthy books to be read?
Awe & wonder
If we are going to help our children maintain the awe and wonder that come so naturally to young children when they look at God’s world, we need to remember to develop that awe and wonder ourselves. If that has been lost to us, which can so easily happen in our modern day and age, we can look to our little children and re-enter this way of looking at the world with them.
Observe, ponder, and discover the world around you. Take some time to fill yourself with the same goodness you want to offer your children and I believe some of that wonder can be reawakened.
Being the example
In conclusion, the atmosphere has less to do with the physical and more to do with the spiritual and philosophical atmosphere of the home and homeschool.
Living into this ideal with humility, vision, and prayer helps us guide our children as we learn alongside them on the journey of education.
Discipline
The discipline aspect of education can look a lot more practical than the atmosphere.
Habits for Preschoolers
Discipline in Charlotte Mason’s context refers to habit formation and habit training. Helping to set your child on the right path for “smooth and easy days“.
When we help instill good habits in our children, it helps to develop their character, giving them a gift later on in life.
If they have good habits that are instilled in who they are while they are young, it will be way easier to hang onto those habits instead of retraining themselves from bad habits in adulthood.
Habit training Preschoolers
For preschool-aged children, habit training is essential. This focus is largely what makes up the days of our preschool children.
I like what James Clear author of Atomic Habits says regarding habits…
“Let’s define habits. Habits are the small decisions you make and actions you perform every day. According to researchers at Duke University, habits account for about 40 percent of our behaviors on any given day.
Your life today is essentially the sum of your habits. How in shape or out of shape you are? A result of your habits. How happy or unhappy you are? A result of your habits. How successful or unsuccessful you are? A result of your habits.
What you repeatedly do (i.e. what you spend time thinking about and doing each day) ultimately forms the person you are, the things you believe, and the personality that you portray. Everything I write about – from procrastination and productivity to strength and nutrition – starts with better habits. When you learn to transform your habits, you can transform your life.”
Habits in Homeschooling
Charlotte Mason specifically addresses a few categories of habits for young children in her volume Home Education.
Personal habits
We should help our young ones to develop good habits in personal hygiene, family, life, relationships, and taking care of their things.
Moral habits
Habits of obedience, truthfulness, self-control. Directing their moral compass towards right living.
Spiritual habits
Spiritual habits look like reverence, reading the bible, family devotions, prayer, worship, fellowship, attending church together, observing Advent, Lent, Christmastide, etc.
To sum things up
If most of our life is run by our subconscious habits, it would serve our children well to focus our time on setting them up with habits that will serve them now and in the future.
Visual timetable
A tool that has been very beneficial to our home for preschoolers is a visual timetable.
A visual timetable that includes pictures helps give these young children who are not yet reading an idea of what to expect for the day.
Ordering our time
The heart of classical education is to pursue virtue and an ordered life. This means that we learn how to live in a way that loves the right thing, in the right way, at the right time in our pursuit of education and virtue.
*Remember, a timetable is a tool to serve YOU in your days, not for you to be married to it. Try things out, and change it up if it’s not working. Use this as a guide.
A Preschoolers Timetable
By having a visual timetable, preschoolers can see what is appropriate for each time during the day. There is a time to play, a time to read, a time to nap… this can and should be very flexible, the younger the child is.
As children become older, this concept of knowing where to put our time in a day can help with self-control, deeper focus, and habits that will set a child up for successful, more independent learning.
Having a visual chart using pictures for children of pre-reading age helps with the daily flow of our morning.
Clear expectations for preschoolers
Having clear expectations for preschool-aged children is important to helping them feel secure and capable as a member of the family.
Printable daily rhythm chart for preschoolers
Here is an example of our morning routine in our home with our young children (7,5,4- my 1-year-old does not have one yet). Preschool is a great time to introduce a tool like this.
This daily rhythm chart is an example of what we have used for a visual timetable in our home for smoother transition times in the day.
The front shows our daily morning routine, which my children now complete almost without looking at the chart.
You can download this template to edit yourself in my free subscriber resource library.
Consistency with the Routine = Confident Children
Having a consistent daily routine is incredibly helpful when working on habits with preschool children.
Scheduling consistent and repeated blocks of time throughout the day also helps preschoolers build confidence. As they learn to contribute more to the home, daily take care of their things, and care for their personal hygiene they become more capable which increases their confidence.
Rhythm vs Schedule
With preschool in our home, I rely more on a rhythm versus a schedule. I have found that having a flow versus rigidity is helpful when working with preschoolers.
Preschool-age children don’t have a great concept of time, but they do grasp the consistency of a rhythm.
I.e. after breakfast, we do our morning routine. After our morning routine, we have school time. Following school time we play outside. We have lunch after playing outside. After lunch, we take a nap or rest.
This flow helps a young preschooler know what to expect in the day.
For a look into our preschool homeschool day, you can check out this article here.
Living Ideas for Preschoolers
Living ideas are essential in a character-building education.
As Karen Glass puts it “The opposite of inert knowledge, of course, is living ideas. Ideas reside in the spiritual part of man, and are passed from mind to mind. Whoever said that ideas inspire action is absolutely correct. Information alone, divorced from any ideas, is statistics. We don’t change our behavior because of statistics.” found at the article Imparting Living Ideas to Children from Ambleside Online.
Living ideas spark something inside of us to inspire and lead to action. Just knowing statistics or facts about something doesn’t truly make us care. But being inspired by an idea or a story with a beautiful idea does something different within us as people.
So how do we give our children these living ideas? Great stories and experiences are a few ways to offer living ideas to preschoolers.
Reading time with Preschoolers
Every day in our home, we have reading time. For my preschooler, this often looks like them bringing me a picture book to read with them on my lap. Sometimes they are interested enough to listen in on our reading for my older children’s homeschool lessons. Since my oldest is 7, these books are still interesting to the younger children. But sitting in on lesson readings is not something that I require of my preschooler.
Baskets
Around our home, we have shelves and baskets full of quality, living books that are worthy of my children’s attention and time.
For more book lists and ideas of living books to add to your home library you can check out these posts here:
- Read Aloud Books for Kindergarten (& really the whole family)
- Best Books for an 18-month Old- Home Library Favorites
I have found that only shelving the best books and ideas throughout our home, prompts our children to pick them up and read. They read them because they are in sight and inviting- another trick when setting our homes up for good habits.
Tea time
Additionally, a good time to incorporate reading for preschoolers is a teatime. Anytime a young child is eating or enjoying a fun teatime at the table with the family, is a great time to read a couple of pages of a book.
Morning Time
Morning time, circle time, or morning basket is a popular term in the homeschool world. No matter what term you use, the idea is that there is a set time during the day to present beautiful living ideas to children, often in family style but you can suit this to whatever fits your home.
A basket with books, poetry, art, hymns, folk songs, and maybe a simple handcraft you are working on with your preschooler is a great way to begin with a gentle “homeschool” approach.
Setting time aside each day to enjoy these beautiful ideas can enrich the family and be plenty of sit-down “school” for a preschooler.
Free play
Free play is essential for preschoolers. This undirected time is the time Charlotte Mason would call a quiet growing time. While children play, the living ideas they have taken in are then embodied and acted out. This process and playtime is where the deep learning of a preschooler is happening.
I make sure to protect this time for my child and equip their play spaces with open-ended toys and materials.
The Importance of Outdoor Life for Preschoolers
Children playing outdoors is also essential for preschoolers.
Wonder
Being out in nature, surrounded by things to awe and wonder at, is so important for lifelong delight in learning. Being in nature points to God and helps keep us humble as we marvel at the world around us that He has created.
When children are given time to explore outside, they learn a lot about God’s world. From watching the little ladybug to checking on a garden every day, so much is being taken in during this time.
Giving children time to wonder and ponder the creation around them is one of the best parts of being able to home educate.
Proper Clothing for Preschoolers
To succeed in actually going outside, it is helpful to have the right clothing for the weather in your area. The right clothing makes this time as enjoyable as possible for you and your preschooler.
Go with them vs. Sending them out
It can also be helpful for the child to get used to playing outside if you go out with them. Being outdoors is important for children and it is just as important for the mother.
This does not mean mom is directing or teaching at this time but simply being present and enjoying the outdoors yourself.
It can be difficult to remember the importance of getting outside when it feels like we have so much to do inside the home, but the benefits of a few hours outside with your children outweigh the house tasks that have been put on pause.
Nature trails & Open spaces
Visiting parks can be fun, but I encourage you to try taking your children on a nature trail or letting them explore outside without other structures. You will be amazed at what they notice in the world around them.
Either way, the fresh air, clouds, and time to look at the world outside are beneficial however you can make it happen.
What are some key moments in your day with a preschooler in your homeschool? Any favorite activities you have loved while homeschooling your preschool student?
*If this article was helpful to you, please consider sharing with a friend!
It is my dream to hopefully homeschool my babies! Saving for future!
A great dream to have! Thank you for sharing 🙂