I’m so thankful I get to spend time with my children for their preschool years. First, I share our curriculum choices and why we use them. Keep reading to find out how we explored the Letter J. Finally, at the bottom, we list our favorite supplies for the preschool years.
PRESCHOOL CURRICULUM
SUPPORTS AMPLE NATURE TIME
- The Peaceful Preschool – The schedule is amazing because it sets aside one day per week for field trips
- Exploring Nature with Children – This works well for my family because it is centered around being outdoors
- The Abundant Gardener – We are learning more about gardening together so this will naturally provide chances to visit gardens, plant stores, and be outside on our land
THE PEACEFUL PRESCHOOL
We currently follow the Peaceful Preschool curriculum by Jennifer Pepito and we love it! The content is full of rich literature, therefore it is a perfect fit for my book-loving family. We read through many rich, classic stories. We also complete playful projects to go with the literature theme or letter. Download Unit A for free to try it out with your littles to see if you like it.
The community she has created is such a beautiful resource and I’m grateful to be a part of it. Jennifer has included a wonderful preschool e-book which helps you prepare to guide your child in early learning. We have found her curriculum perfect for our homeschool preschool. The curriculum is comprised of Read Aloud, Phonics, Counting Skills, Fine Motor Skills, Large Motor Skills, Practical Life Skills, and Art Skills. Also, here is how we enjoyed the letter A unit. Feel free to explore all of our letter units!
LETTER J REVIEW
Its so exciting to discover a new letter together! The focus books for letter J are The Giant Jam Sandwich and Sheep in a Jeep. We also added Jack and the Beanstalk since we all love reading, and I already had a few different older versions from my childhood on hand. Finally, we read the Jesus Storybook Bible Jonah and the Whale story.
GLITTER GLUE LETTERS
Next, we created glitter glue letters. The Peaceful Preschool recommends glitter glue in order to create the finishing touches on sensory, alphabet flashcards. We have used them with all of the letters so far. It is really one of my children’s favorite parts.
My parents gave the boys some Glitter Markers so they were eager for this letter to try them out. Typically, however, we use the glitter glue as mentioned above for this activity since it is recommended by the Peaceful Preschool.
J IS FOR JEEP
For our first book, we read Sheep in a Jeep. The boys liked this book because it is simple with lots of rhyming words. After reading it through the first time, we read through it a few more times, and they took turns finishing the sentences!
I found a tutorial on You Tube on how to draw a simple jeep. We each drew a jeep on these watercolor postcards we had left over from my older son’s art birthday party. My older son did an excellent job drawing out his jeep, although he got frustrated with some of the process, so he made a second drawing.
My youngest son LOVES these oil pastels so I thought he would be interested in coloring in the jeep I drew with them. When he finishes up a picture, he loves to rub his fingers all over the chalk or oil drawing. We have so much fun using our hands to create and learn!
COUNTING
Since we were focusing on a jeep/car theme, we gathered toy cars from around the house. Next, the boys sorted them by color, and matched them with their corresponding number cards. My youngest loves to trace the numbers and letters with his fingers, and my oldest also sorted them by size!
J IS FOR JONAH
We LOVE Jesus and the Storybook Bible. Next to Nature Anatomy, it is probably one of our most well-read books. My boys love manipulating the play dough. Since I try hard to keep natural materials for our children to play with, I usually purchase natural options or make our own. We purchased this lovely wooden play dough set more than a year ago and it has had lots of use! I love how it comes with some lavender and chamomile calming herbs to enhance the senses.
We also brought out some sea creature cookie cutters we used in our letter F unit to go along with the Jonah and the Whale study. The boys took turns making sea creatures from modeling clay.
LETTER J WRITING PRACTICE
I saw this idea from my friend on Instagram. She traced over this letter board so we just had to try it too! The boys were delighted to see the letters show up on the paper because they are beautiful! My oldest son is interested in handwriting and therefore we practice handwriting often in the car. I love using these mini chalkboards because they are convenient, a great size, and come in their own pouch for easy clean up!
J IS FOR JAM
We make it a priority to eat nourishing foods, so when I found this lovely wildberry jam at Whole Foods that contains no sugar I was super excited! The boys spread it on gluten free toast on their own and made a delicious snack to enjoy while we read through the Giant Jam Sandwich.
We were able to check this book out, from our local library. It was a big hit because it was also the audio version. We read through this story about 15 times. The boys didn’t want to take the book back to the library since they loved it so much! If you have never read this book, I highly recommend it!
Previously, we made homemade strawberry jam together. Here is the recipe here if you want to give it a try because it is so simple and easy!
Finally, we painted our letter J template with jam!
J IS FOR JELLY
These three part cards can be found at Simply Learning Kids. My boys are finally grasping this activity well enough to do all of the cards in one sitting. We finished off the activity with a Peanut Butter and Jelly Larabar! I feel good about giving these as a convenient snack to my boys occassionally because they are gluten free, contain simple ingredients, and they love them! I have found the price is better on Amazon so if we are going to have them, I make sure to order them there.
Finally, we practiced handwriting skills with these free sheets from Simply Learning Kids. We have used these alphabet stamps many times. This was one of the first times my oldest son tried to write the word completely on his own, which was super fun to observe!
SUPPLIES
The Giant Jam Sandwich
Jesus Storybook Bible
Glitter Glue
Oil Pastels
Modeling Clay
Alphabet Stamps
Watercolor Paint Brushes
Tactile Letters
Rainbow Stamp Pad
OUR PICKS
Finally, here is how we enjoyed the letter A unit. We had so much fun with letter A and can’t wait to share the next letter with you!
