Learning Poster

I don't really make "resolutions" because if I call them that they don't get done. =) But I did think about some things I want to improve and very near the top of the list was being a better mom. I decided that was a little too broad and that list a little too long so I narrowed it down to being better at teaching my kids. My sister told me about this poster that her sister-in-law, Linda, did a long time ago and I finally got off my rear and put one together for Weston. I decided to share it to help save other mom's the work, because it was a lot of work! All the credit for this goes to letteroftheweek.com. That's where all of this material was found. Here is the final product. I originally was going to laminate everything so that I could could reuse it but it was just too expensive. So everything sat in my closet for a week or two until I came up with the rather brilliant idea-if I do say so myself-to use my millions of sheet protectors and make little pockets to put everything in. I'm really happy with how it turned out.

Then I made myself a binder that has everything in one sheet protector for each week and a list of the weeks in the front, just in case things get mixed around.

I changed things around to have "snow" be the theme for week 1

since there was lots of it and I plan on starting this at the beginning of next year for Saydi too since she'll

be 1 1/2. So to start the week off

Weston and I bundled up and head out to play in the snow. Which he had mixed feelings about since he couldn't really walk in it, but once we got his stroller down for him to push in the driveway just like he did all summer, I couldn't get him to go back inside. We also headed to the library to get a bunch of books about snow. Since Weston can be hard to tame at the library I've just been reserving them before we go and then our trip is much shorter and I don't have to look everywhere for books on whatever the theme is. For the pictures on the poster I just did a google image search of the word and found tons of pictures to choose from.

Day two Weston added the word "snow" to his vocabulary as I told him it was poster time. I could not have been more thrilled

that it was already catching on with him! We worked on the number one so I made rice krispie treats and had him put the marshmallows in the bowl one at a time. This was difficult for him since he wanted to just grab them all but when I told him to just put in one he would let go of the other ones he had grabbed and just put one in. I cut them out to look like the number 1 when we were finished. Weston had these flash cards that have the numbers up to 26 and the whole alphabet. I loathe picking them all up after he scatters them around everywhere so I figured this was a good way to retire them and still get good use from them. Linda found some cards at the dollar store though so that's another option.

Each week we will alternate either a shape or color. This week was "square" and Weston added that word to his vocabulary also as we found coloring pages and traced around the squares in each page (another idea from Linda).

For the letter A I just made some block letters that he could trace the inside of (which he didn't) but he did enjoy coloring all over them as I repeatedly pointed out the letter A and listed things that start with "A".

Letter of the week has nursery rhymes but I decided I wanted to incorporate a church activity so we will alternate doing primary songs and learning the articles of faith. I chose songs that Weston is singing in nursery to help him enjoy his time there more and this week we of course did "Once There Was a Snowman".

We did this little snowman craft and I sang the song to Weston using my little snowman as a prop. He usually just grins and watches me make a fool of myself rather then joining in when we sing songs but hopefully he'll learn it even though he doesn't participate. =) He got a little bored of the craft because I wasn't letting him use his glue stick as chapstick. Go figure. Anyway, each week I've decided we'll do a craft of some kind (yet another idea from Linda) to help him learn something from the week.

For the vocabulary word I found coloring pages that had snow flakes and pointed out the flakes to him. Some of the vocabulary words are way beyond him, and some of the other things on the poster too, but I didn't change them because I thought that would keep him interested so that next year when we do it again with Saydi she can learn the simpler things and Weston can work on the harder things.

So far Weston is really loving it. We just spend a short amount of time doing these things each day (sometimes as little as five minutes if his attention span is not so great) but he always gets excited when he gets up from his nap and I tell him it's poster time. I have all the stuff for the poster (except for the numbers and letters) saved in Word documents so if any of you other mommies are interested in doing this you can leave a comment with your email or if you'd rather not leave your email on here you can send me an email at jenn.carlson@gmail.com. I'm going to make a link on the side of my blog so that if your kids are younger and you want to wait or if you change your mind later you can easily find this post and send me an email. And now I have a lot less guilt when Weston wants to watch a show because I know we have a scheduled time each day to learn something!