Now I understand why moms do the letter of the week activity for their toddlers. It not only teaches their kids multiple concepts but it also gives direction to moms like me on what we should do for the day! 🙂 We’re now at letter I, the second letter of Timmy’s name. I was actually a bit nervous when I was preparing for his lessons because I know that I is a pretty challenging letter. There are a few I words that toddlers could actually understand. I really praise and thank God because He has been giving on-the-spot ideas to make our letter I activities fun and exciting! Here’s how our week went:
Bible Character
Our Bible character is IMMANUEL and our memory verse is Isaiah 7:17 (starts with I, too!) So basically we read the Christmas story through out the week and watched some videos about Jesus and Christmas! 🙂 I’m sticking with my pyramid-style visuals because Timmy really digs it! He still uses his Timothy makeshift pyramid verse. 🙂
Reading
I got some books that begin with I but the blockbuster in the pile is “Should I Share My Ice Cream?” by Mo Willems! That book is heaven sent! My good friend Diane of The Hippomum (you should check out her blog!) sent a birthday box full of surprises for Timmy last month. She had no clue that Timmy LOVES ELEPHANT AND PIGGIE BOOKS. We read that book almost every day. He makes sure that “Should I Share My Ice Cream?” is included in our reading pile. 🙂 This week, I also encouraged him to read other I books like “Itsy Bitsy Spider” and he enjoyed it, too!
Math
This one is fun! We counted ice cubes! Timmy used tongs to pick up the ice. So aside from his counting practice, he also had fine motor exercise! 🙂 I also drew pictures that start with I and gave Timmy “less” and “more” stickers. All he needed to do was count the objects and place the correct sticker. 🙂 He was careful not to mess up because that meant he needed to remove the sticker and ruin the paper. Haha! Thankfully, he got everything correct! 🙂
Writing
I gave him some writing sheets to practice writing I step by step. He didn’t get it at first. I then saw that he liked to write without following a pattern. He wanted to discover it on his own. So I gave him words that start with I and left the first letter blank. I then saw how quickly he was able to write I because he needed to complete the word and read it! Seeing that he was on a roll, I took the opportunity to give him more words including his name! I suddenly discovered a way to teach him to write his name. It’s like doing fill in the blanks but this time he needed to fill it with letters. 🙂 Perfect!
Art
Of course we had to make ICE CREAM! 🙂 I cut some foam as ice cream scoops and asked Timmy to create his own ice cream. 🙂 He also designed his sweet creation after. Timmy’s always beaming with pride when he’s showing his artwork to his dad. I think he was extra proud of this one because he really exerted a lot of effort doing his ice cream. 🙂
Science
We learned about INSECTS! I found an insect poster at National Book Store (P8.75 only!). I cut it and placed each one on cardboard to make insect cards. 🙂 I explained to Timmy what insects eat, why we need to be careful with certain insects, and more. We also read about insects in his book about bugs. 🙂 We played a guessing game later on when he became familiar with the insects’ names. We also played a multiple choice type of game. I showed him two insects and asked him, “Which one is the mosquito?” then he picked the card and gave it to me. 🙂 Later on, I saw him playing with the cards and making them fall like rain. He liked that it was light and the fan was blowing it everywhere. Haha! That was literally a learning-through-play moment. 🙂
English, Crafts, and Science combined (Haha!)
I thought it would be pretty cool to create an ISLAND for Timmy! So I got the case of our digital blood pressure apparatus, wrapped it in brown paper, placed it on top of blue paper to make an island. I then cut foam trees so that Timmy can design his island. I also surprised Timmy by creating a book for him! It has words that start with I to help familiarize him with more I words. 🙂 Aside from that, I also wanted to teach Timmy about IGUANA. So I decided to draw one and put some quick facts on the side. I gave it to him as a “pet” and he loved it! He started talking and reading to the iguana drawing the moment he got it. Haha! Although we were done with science the previous day, we still had the iguana lesson before we did the island crafts and story. 🙂 The great thing about toddlers is that they still have no idea that they’re going through certain subjects. So even if it appeared from my perspective that we weren’t organized that day, what’s important was he had fun learning different concepts from different subjects without him knowing it! 🙂
Filipino
To make learning Filipino fun for him I made small placards using popsicle sticks and colored papers. One side contains the English word and the other has the Filipino translation. We also spoke in Filipino and used the words in a sentence to help him practice our native tongue. 🙂 My husband and I are making sure that we speak to him in Filipino more especially now that he’s able to understand and grasp the meaning of words faster. 🙂 Upon learning that “ito” means “this” he said, “Ito si Mishka.” Mishka is the name of his dog stuffed toy. 🙂
Timmy also had his pop culture fix with daddy by watching some IRON MAN videos and learning about the cool suits of the billionaire superhero. 🙂 I wasn’t able to take any photos because I was too sleepy when they were having their Iron Man stories. 🙂
Next week we’re doing M! Let’s see if Timmy gets to write his short nickname (TIM) after next week. 🙂 Hope these activities give you some ideas to keep your toddler busy and learning. Ciao! 🙂
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