My family loves homeschooling. In fact, we love it so much that when my youngest daughter turned three, she started asking to join in. Many families start homeschooling their preschoolers like we did. She would watch some of her siblings’ video lessons; she would scribble on pieces of paper and place them in the folder where we kept finished worktext pages; she would even pretend to take the weekly spelling test!
We knew that we didn’t want my daughter to start kindergarten when she was three—she wasn’t developmentally ready for that and it would have frustrated her. Plus we wanted her to have time to enjoy being a kid. But we realized that we could do preschool activities at home with her. We could dedicate some time each day to work on some school-readiness skills through guided play. She was happy to be “doing school” like her older sisters, and I enjoyed watching her grow through our time together.
Can I homeschool my preschooler?
Preschool is a great time to start homeschooling. Since there are no state regulations for preschool homeschooling, starting with preschool allows you to ease into homeschooling without the added pressure of having to report attendance or academic progress.
Why Preschool Is Important
Preschool is not required in any state, but it can help your child get ready for future learning. Here’s how.
Preschool Activities Get Your Child Excited About Learning
One of the big goals of homeschooling preschool is to build excitement for further learning. Since most preschool learning is done through guided play, preschool serves as an important bridge between carefree play and more structured learning.
Preschool Activities Can Help Develop Your Child’s Motor Skills
In order for your child to be successful in kindergarten, he or she will need to have both gross and fine motor skills. You as a parent can start building these necessary muscles through preschool play activities.
Preschool Activities Can Prepare Your Child for Academic Success
Another goal of preschool homeschooling is the development of foundational academic skills. The development of pre-literacy skills such as phonemic awareness, print awareness, visual and sound discrimination, and sequencing will help prepare your child to read just as the development of counting skills will help your child with math readiness.
What’s the difference between preschool and kindergarten?
Traditionally, the term “preschool” refers to teaching 3- and 4-year olds through guided play that is focused on developing school-readiness skills such as pre-literacy skills, the improvement of motor skills, and some foundational math skills such as number recognition and counting.
Kindergarten, on the other hand, is a much more structured learning program that is typically taught to 5- or 6-year-olds. An effective kindergarten curriculum will still include a lot of active play, but kindergarteners are also expected to be able to sit and attentively listen for short periods of time. A kindergarten curriculum is usually focused on building reading, writing, and math skills.
When to Start Preschool at Home
Perhaps you are wondering—is my child ready for preschool? If you are a parent to multiple children, you know that every child is different. Some three-year-olds may be ready to start preschool activities, but some need to wait longer. Here are some things to look for to see if your child is ready to start preschool at home.
Your child can follow simple directions.
Even though preschoolers should be learning primarily through directed play, they do need to be able to follow simple directions (one to three steps). If they can’t, they may become frustrated with or fail to fully benefit from activities.
Your child can focus on a task for short periods of time.
Most preschoolers have short attention spans, but in order for them to benefit from preschool activities, they do need to be able to focus on a task for several minutes (ten minutes is a good goal). If your child is consistently abandoning activities after only a few minutes, they may need a little more time to mature.
Your child can communicate with you in an understandable way.
Preschoolers have limited vocabularies and usually speak in short sentences. But before starting preschool, your child should be able to answer questions, describe an object, and recount a recent event in an understandable way. These communication skills are necessary so that you can assess how much they are learning.
Your child shows interest in school.
Does your preschooler try to participate in an older sibling’s schoolwork? Does he or she pretend to do school or pretend to read and write? Kids who show interest in school will be much more motivated to learn.
What does a 3- or 4-year-old learn in preschool?
Below are some skills that 3- or 4-years olds typically learn in preschool.
Pre-literacy Skills
- Name all uppercase letters and some lowercase letters
- Identify initial letter sounds
- Tell a story using pictures
- Recognize their first name
Math Skills
- Count to 10
- Recognize and name numerals 1-10
- Name basic shapes (square, circle, triangle, rectangle)
- Identify the days of the week and their order
Other Skills
- Name colors
- Identify body parts
Writing & Motor Skills
- Hold a pencil correctly
- Write first name
- Trace lines
- Color within lines
- Cut lines with child-sized scissors
How do preschoolers learn best?
A preschooler’s brain is in what scientists call a “critical period.” From ages 2-7, the number of connections between brain cells is rapidly expanding. According to “Critical Periods of Brain Development,” sensory experiences are necessary for optimal brain health during this time frame. In other words, your preschooler is going to learn best by using their senses to explore the world around them. Since one of the goals of preschool is to encourage a love of learning, most preschool programs will include a lot of play.
What are some examples of preschool play? Preschool play looks like the following:
- Making bead necklaces
- Painting
- Cutting out pictures
- Singing songs or repeating silly rhymes
- Role playing
- Sorting
- Simple board or card games (like Candy Land, Uno, or Memory)
- Collecting items in nature
While they are playing, you will want to be interacting with your preschooler. Introduce them to new vocabulary—“That’s a daisy. See it has white petals and a yellow center.” Ask them questions about what they are experiencing—“What does the paint feel like if you touch it?” Practice foundational skills like counting—“Let’s count how many acorns we found so far.”
Even though play is very important, your preschooler also needs to learn to sit still and focus for short periods of time. Having your child sit while you read a book (or several) is a great way to start working on that skill.
How to Schedule Preschool
Homeschooling preschoolers doesn’t need to take a lot of time. Even though your neighbor might spend 3-5 hours in a preschool classroom, you don’t need to devote that much time to homeschooling your preschooler—remember that learning often happens much more quickly in a one-on-one environment. You may only be able to dedicate an hour to working on preschool activities with your child—that’s okay!
You do, however, want to start with a plan. Consistency is key, so look at your daily schedule and find two or three 20-minute blocks of time that you can consistently dedicate to homeschooling your preschooler. The BJU Press Homeschool Hub Planner is a great tool for planning out your schedule, especially if you have other school-age children. You can also look through “The Best Homeschool Planner for your Busy Schedule” to see if any of those options would meet your needs.
Make sure that you go at your child’s pace and don’t feel frustrated if it takes a while for your child to grasp a concept or perform a task. Remember that your child’s mind and body are still maturing.
Choosing Homeschool Preschool Curriculum
Your homeschool preschool curriculum encompasses more than just printed materials. It should help you teach your children through guided play. It is not necessary to spend a lot of money on a homeschool preschool curriculum—you can get a lot of ideas online and through books at your local library. However, a packaged curriculum will save you a lot of time. You can check out “How to Choose the Best Homeschool Curriculum for Your Family” for tips on navigating the many options that are available to you.
All of my daughters have used BJU Press’s K4 curriculum for preschool. Two used it in a school setting, but the younger two we homeschooled starting in preschool. One of my daughters started it when she was three (2 months shy of being 4), but the other three were four when they started. We found it to be a great program for teaching them many of those important school-readiness skills. But most importantly, it started establishing in them a biblical view of the world. What a great start to their academic journey!
BJU Press also offers a preschool curriculum for three-year-olds as well as a video option for four-year-olds.
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