Tot School Tuesday: The Beginning of Our Things That Go Adventures!

Welcome Back to Tot School Tuesday! The goal of this weekly blog is to share with you my experiences in Tot School. If you missed the beginning of the adventure, you can check out my last two weeks' posts here:

Tot School with #TeacherMom (Aug 18)

Tot School Tuesday: Things That Go (Aug 25)

To summarize: I'm diving in to the world of Tot School! I have a lot of ideas and a general plan but know that there will be a lot of learning and modifying as I go, so bear with me as we adventure through this together!

Last week, Beckett & I started working through some of our "Things That Go" plans & materials (available for FREE until Sept 22!). I AM LOVING IT SO MUCH! His curiousity and attention span are MELTING MY HEART. He's excited every time I pull out an activity! Hopefully, we can both keep up the energy. :)

Here are a few highlights on what I'm doing and lessons that I've learned.

Pom Pom Sort

The first day we attempted the pom pom sort, it was a hot mess. First, I just dumped all of the poms out and tried to explain the activity. HA! Beckett was not ready for that. I wanted him to put red in one column and yellow in another. I quickly realized that I needed to pull out JUST the red and yellow items.

Here's how we did at first (with a lot of guidance!):

This wasn't working for us, so I decided he needed more structure. I ran into the kitchen and grabbed two of my Ikea kid's bowls (which don't have red). 

From there, he did significantly better. He already knew these two colors (inconsistently) so with each pom/item he chose I said something along the lines of, "ooh! what color is that?!" and then after he answered, "yes! now where is the BLUE bowl; can you put it in the BLUE bowl?"

With these modifications, he totally rocked this activity and I was able to switch up the colors later in the week with no issue. One side note: I got these plastic tongs at the Dollar Tree. They were PERFECT for grabbing items easily and had the perfect amount of tension, size, & a great little cuppy end that easily held onto items. BUT THEY BROKE. He broke two sets before I switched to my Pampered Chef tongs. These are much more difficult to use, but he got the hang of it and isn't going to break them!

Because I don't have enough color bowls to continue to do this activity, I decided we needed cutie themed mats to use. These will also be available in my store for free until September 22. For these, you can drop the pieces straight onto the cards/mat, put clear cups on top of or next to the cards/mat, or insert the cards into a big muffin tin! The set includes 11 colors. Grab them here!

Color Parking Lot

The color parking lot was a lot of fun. To use this activity, I introduced one car at a time, talked about the name (bus, car, truck) and color, then we pretended to drive it around making fun sounds. Of course, I use a lot of praise for his answers and imaginative play. 

With lots of modeling and prompting, I eventually guided him to find the matching color boxes and drive the cars to the appropriate place. This was a bit of work, because he also really enjoyed just drivin the cars around. I am 100% ok with that and have set a goal of NOT being overly task oriented. I want him to enjoy this experience, but learn at the same time!

Alphabet Road Book 

This is probably one of my favorite activities this month. I just think that it's such an adorable idea. I found it on Playdough to Plato. You can grab yours here. 

Tracing is not one of Beckett's strong suits. This activity is proving to be pretty difficult for him, but he is very entertained at the idea of driving his cars on the book, so I'm very hopeful that it will be a good activity to help with his tracing concepts! We'll just pull this one out more than others!

Remember when you're doing activities like these to be intentional about incorporating your lesson goals. When we choose a page, we talk about the letters he sees and then he chooses which one he wants to drive on. I model for him often. We also talk about the vehicle he is chosing to use and the color of the vehicle or page. If he's not interested in answering my questions, that's ok too. I try and use the vocabulary often, "wow! I love this red car!! I think I'm going to drive the red car on the C. Want to watch? Would YOU like to drive the red car on the C!?"

Books!

We read books A LOT throughout our day. I have set out all of his transportation books on a shelf in our front room so they are easily accessible and a first choice when he's ready to read. Sometimes, we read the book verbatim and sometimes we just talk about the pictures.

I love this book because it has simple single pictures on each page, and the colors are very easiy to identify. When we read this book, I have chosen to ignore the actual names of the trucks and call them all "truck." We talk about the color and I asked questions, "Do you see the yellow truck? What color is this truck?" We also identify the letters we see on each page. 

Letter Sorting

This activity was not on the materials list, but Beckett wanted to play with his letters, so this is what I did! We pulled out the letter cards, reviewed them, and then pulled out a bunch of appropriate letter beads. I walked Beckett through identifying the letters, and matching them to the appropriate card. We also spent time talking about the pictures & beginning sounds. 

What are you currently doing with your tot? Whether you're doing this Things That Go unit or are using a completely different plan,  I would love to collaborate and share ideas with each other and other mommies! Please feel free to link up with me! If you'd like to add in a shout out, I'd love for you to link your post back here. However, this isn't required! ;) Make sure to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, or Blog Lovin to get updates on new posts on Tot School and more!

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