Preschool Lesson Planning: Units and Themes

This is one of a few posts about how I plan our preschool lessons.

Thank you, captain obvious.

I am not a "pintrest perfect" kind of person--- I don't have every day meticulously mapped out or our school room decorated perfectly to match the theme. Most days I'm not really sure what *specifically* we're going to do until we do it. This works for us--- I think it's actually a great strategy for toddlers and preschoolers as it is very flexible. So, if you're yearning for this type of existence (hehe), read along.

If you're the kind of person that needs every minute of the day mapped out, I'm telling you this might not be the best post for you. Well, actually, it might, as I have some (I think) good tips for beginning lesson planning, as that's as far as I generally get. So that could be helpful :)

Uno:
Pick a theme.

I have a "school binder" that I write down ideas in--- at some point this was intended to be a schedule and a lesson planner, but that failed miserably. But I keep it by our school stuff and write down themes and ideas as they come to me. Like "Hey, we should do construction vehicles, it'd be cool to build a whole construction site in the playroom." (Whoa now, that IS a good idea. To the binder I go...) So I have a list of themes that I *think* bean and possibly bug will be interested in. Some of them are random (like the construction idea), some spurred by conversations we've had (like if she asks a lot of questions about certain things one week, maybe the human body or seasons, etc.), and some are more methodical (centered around holidays, events, etc).

Some of the themes we have done or plan to do:
Pirates
Clouds/Sky (Creation Day 2)
Plants and Trees (Creation Day 3)
Space/The Universe (Creation Day 4)
Oceans/Fish (Creation Day 5)
Birds (Creation Day 5)
The Human Body (Creation Day 6)
Family
Where I Live
Helpers
Hockey (you knew it was coming--- sadly, probably not coming this season)
Construction (Bean LOVES "snorts"--- or bulldozers, as others call them)
The Farm

For pretty much the whole year our theme has been "The Days of Creation." This worked really well for our first year because it was pretty much tailor made. There are 7-ish set things to study, they go in order, and it gives me a good guideline. It's easy to work in our bible time with little-to-no-reaching (like there was with the pirate theme).

This upcoming unit we are doing Day 5--- Fish and Birds. Actually, we are just doing Fish/Oceans for the first part.

I have been interpreting the "Creation" themes fairly liberally--- for example, we did Day 2 as clouds and sky, based on Genesis 1:6-8 (Then God said, "Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters." Thus God made the firmament, and divided the waters which [were] under the firmament from the waters which [were] above the firmament; and it was so.And God called the firmament Heaven. So the evening and the morning were the second day.")
Day 4, which we are currently doing, when God created the sun, moon and stars (Genesis 1:14-19), is a general overview of space--- including planets, comets, asteroids, etc.


The reason I like this system of choosing topics is twofold: it's flexible and it's child-led. At Bean's age (a ripe ole 3), she can learn her basics from pretty much any topic. I can teach letters using blocks and construction as easily as using stars and planets. I can do math and patterns with flowers as well as with hockey pucks. I know the basics of where she is and where she needs to go and I have some activities that I can do with any topic that we pick (I think. We'll see if she stumps me one day with something off the wall and nutso).  If her interests change (like she doesn't like snorts in a few weeks) before I get to use a unit--- oh well. I just use a different one. If I can't find and/or get all the books I want for a specific subject (and Bean reads... this kid will go through 10-12 library books, at least, on any given topic, so this has been an issue for us) I just choose something else.

Not sure if that was too helpful except to say this: the great thing about doing preschool at home is that it can be very interest-led, so the sky is the limit!!

Stay tuned: Next post (on this subject, at least) will be about the actual meat of the "curriculum" of each theme. Exciting, eh?

Bittersweet Christmas

It's that time of year ago...

That time of presents and trees and Santa and... oh, wait.

No, it's not THAT time.

That time of Jesus.

It's THAT time.

Last night at a Ladies Christmas Party, a beautiful young woman with a beautiful voice sang a beautiful song called "Breath of Heaven." Its a song written from the perspective of Mary. And it got me thinking, as pretty much everything Mary-related does this time of year, about the mother of God.

I know this is a happy time of year, when we celebrate the only gift that really matters, the gift of God's love through his Son, Jesus.

But it's a bittersweet time, too, and anything about Mary makes me remember the sad side of Christmas.

I remember very clearly one of the saddest moments I have had as a mother--- I was sitting in the hospital with my brand new baby, my first baby, my little Bean, staring at her sweet little face in the middle of the night. And it hit me--- I cannot protect her. One day, too soon, this sweet little face is going to be crumpled up in heartache over the first time a friend betrays her. Over the first time she is invisible to the boy she likes. Over the first time her heart is broken. And I can't stop it.

Bean was born at the start of the Christmas season, and I remember thinking that night about Mary. We read about the angel appearing to her and her faithfulness. But we don't read about her sorrow. We don't read about what must have been happening in her heart--- she knew she was carrying the Son of God,; she knew she was carrying the Messiah. She knew she was carrying a baby she would love with all her heart. And she knew, she MUST have known, being a Jewish woman, what her baby would face in His life. She knew, for 9 months and 30 years after that, that the baby she loved with all her heart would face severe rejection, ridicule, hatred, and eventually a beating that left Him unable to be recognized followed by a horrible death. And she couldn't stop it.

And I am brought to tears now every time I think about this woman who not only faced the worst heartache any woman can face--- the death of their child--- but lived the majority of her life and all of His life with that looming on the horizon. And then I realize that not only did Mary face this--- God the father faced this as well. With even more knowledge. With even more foresight.  But He loved us enough to do it. He loves us THAT much.

I'm not trying to be a downer, but let's be honest--- Christmas is nothing without the sacrifice of the cross to follow it. If all we think about on Christmas is joy, we are missing something--- a HUGE something--- that this sweet baby who's birthday we are celebrating lived a short thirty-something years on earth and died a horrific death.

And that, on top of that, Christ lived his whole life KNOWING not only that He was destined to die, but that He was destined to die in that horrible way. Do you realize that? That as a Jewish child, Jesus had to be fully versed in the scriptures by the time he reached "adulthood" in the Jewish world--- 13. And the scriptures clearly tell of the kind of death the Messiah would face. And crucifixion was a VERY common death in that day; so common that he probably walked by men dying this death on the side of the road on a daily basis. So, by the time he was 13, Jesus faced every day knowing the death that was to come to Him, and he chose to do it anyway.

Is Christmas joyful? Of course! God loves us! We are washed in His blood because of what started on Christmas. But it's nothing without the sacrifice and the sadness that comes with it...