Preschool Learning Activities You Can Do at Home

Nov 2, 2010
Lorelei Sieja

You Can Teach Your Child to Read - photo by Tory

There are many activities you can do with your young child to help prepare for kindergarten. Teach self-help skills to build confidence.

There is a wide spectrum of skills young children should learn before attending kindergarten. There are literacy skills, like recognizing the alphabet, seeing the difference between similar letters like b,p,q, and d, and knowing the sounds they make.

Teaching Literacy Skills to Preschoolers

You can teach literacy skills easily in a few minutes a day. Don't work too long or bore your child: learning should be exciting! Learning means spending time with you, a child's favorite activity. You can get a deck of alphabet flashcards at the store, or make your own. After meals, for a few minutes, work with your child, then put the cards away. If he says the name of the letter correctly, let him hold the card. When he has learned all the names, progress on to sounds. When he has mastered the sounds, then play a sort of memory game with the cards, helping him to see the differences between letters.

Teach your child to LOVE books! Teach him how to hold a book correctly, and not tear the pages. Read to him at other times throughout the day, not just nap time or bedtime. Buy him books for birthday and Christmas presents. Let him see you read books, collect books, and borrow books from the library. Return your books on time, to teach him respect and responsibility. If he accidentally tears a page in a book, show him how you'll tape the page together, like putting a band-aid on a boo-boo. Then remind him to handle books with care, or he may have to lose the right to have a book for a day. A child who loves books will be a good reader.

Math Skills to Teach your Child

Preschool math begins with understanding a one-to-one correspondence. Until a child understands that, addition and subtraction will seem like magic tricks. One-to-one correspondence is nothing more than matching different sets. Put one spoon by every plate at the table. Put one napkin by every fork. Put one shoe on each foot. Put one tea cup in front of each baby doll. Match up one crayon to each marker. Do you have any left over?

Doing puzzles is also a great pre-math activity. The child needs to recognize shape and position, then manipulate the puzzle piece until it will fit in the space. Puzzles help children develop logical thinking skills. Do puzzles with your child often! When you buy a new puzzle, do it with him several times, until he wants to do it by himself. You should sit near him and work on a different puzzle, so you can praise him for his effort. Don't put puzzles in a toy box! Keep them out of reach, or in the kitchen. Do puzzles at the table so the pieces don't get lost.

Teach your child to count to ten. Count when you brush her hair. How high can she count? Count when you watch train cars go by on the tracks. How many cars? Count when you put grocery items on the conveyor belt. How many items did you buy? Have your child jump up and down while counting during any commercial break if you watch television together. If your youngster has mastered counting, then move on to skip counting (count by twos) - although this is a pretty advanced skill for preschool.

Self Care Fosters Confidence

Teach your child how to do zippers, buckles, snaps, buttons, velcro, and tie shoe laces. Your child should be dressing by herself around the time she is toilet trained. Teach her how to put on her own jacket, snow boots, scarf, mittens, and snow pants. The kindergarten teacher is not going to have time to dress an entire classroom, and outside playtime is only ten or fifteen minutes long. The child that can dress herself on the first day of school might go around to help others with their zippers, which is a real confidence booster for the helper. Children who can't pull up their zippers are sometimes embarrassed to leave the bathroom stall at school.

There is a way to teach even a two and a half year old how to put on his own jacket - a method often used in preschools. Lay the jacket out flat on the floor, then stand by the hood. Slip both arms into the sleeves and flip the jacket over the head. All that's left is to zip the zipper!

Help Your Child Learn to Use Scissors

Many parents are afraid to give their preschoolers scissors - and with good reason. Just about every small child tries to cut his or her own hair at least once. The answer, though, is just not to put scissors in the toy box. Keep them in the kitchen (where I keep all our art materials) and only allow their use when you can supervise. All young children need to use scissors regularly to develop the fine motor control necessary to cut on a line. Just about every kindergarten worksheet I've ever seen is some variation of "cut on the line and paste..." I'm not in favor of worksheets anyway, but your child will have hours of pleasure playing with his scissors. So here's some suggestions:

Set your youngster in a large box or toy splash pool. Let him cut up all your junk mail. When he's done, just have him stand up and shake. All the little scraps remain in the pool, making clean up a snap.
Give your child the Sunday comics, and let her cut out all the squares. An older child might try to put the boxes in sequence, but for now, just use this as a cutting exercise.
Let your child cut shapes from his birthday wrapping paper. Then paste a collage of the different papers onto a sheet of construction paper for a pretty picture to place on the refrigerator.
Let your child practice cutting playdough. It is easier to cut than paper, and it is a completely recyclable activity.

Teach Your Child to Speak Clearly

No more baby talk. For some families, this isn't an issue. They have spoken clearly to their child since she was born, and their sweet daughter can say the sounds in words like "hallelujah" and "alligator" without substituting a "w" for the "L" sound. For most of us, though, we're used to translating "a-wee-ga-or" as "alligator", and "i-hav-a-pee" as it's time to find a bath room. Between the age of three and four, though, it's time to eliminate all baby talk from your child's vocabulary. He is not going to be amused on his wedding day when you tell everyone how he used to say "mazy geen" for magazine.

Sometimes all you need to do is speak clearly, and your child will correct herself. When this fails, you may need to over-enunciate words. You may need to teach her exactly how to make an "L" sound. Show her how your tongue touches the roof of your mouth behind your front teeth. Ask her to say lollipop, lemonade, licorice, and lovely.

Any other sound that your child isn't making correctly - fix it. Some children say "F" for "th" so they suck their "fumb". Some have trouble saying "S" sounds. But all children - if there is no physical deformity of the mouth - can learn to speak clearly before entering Kindergarten.

Learning Manners May Help Your Child Succeed

We live in a society and societies have rules. We have police officers to help enforce those rules, so that we can enjoy living together. Kids might take toys from one another, but your neighbor cannot come take your car from you! Imagine if you had to tell your spouse, "That's okay, sweetheart, you can have a turn with the car tomorrow."

Is it any wonder our children sometimes get angry? Our children need to learn the rules to getting along with others. They need to learn to say Please and Thank you. When someone gives your child a compliment, teach him to say a simple "thank you". Teach him how to take turns. Teach him the words for emotions, and help him learn to verbalize how he is feeling. Help him to find healthy ways for dealing with anger and other strong emotions. The young adult who does the best in life might not be the best reader or the smartest mathematician. It's far more likely to be the energetic, polite go-getter.

There is so much you can teach your child, limited only by your time and imagination. If you concentrate on what's important, then don't sweat the small stuff.