Chrissy asks: I was curious what kind of things do you do during the day with your little one. Do you work on anything educational or just teach her as you go. Do you just let her be a little one without structured learning yet. I am not for sure of her age. Just curious?
Karis is currently only 14 months, so I have not as yet scheduled any structured activity time. As she becomes more interested in reading together, I will be start incorporating more things this fall. She is not at that stage yet where she can sit still for very long periods of time.
I love giving Karis a good amount of time to play by herself near by me. While I am making dinner or such, she will be exploring. She loves learning how to take things out of the cupboards and drawers in the kitchen and put them back. This is all part of her learning experience. It is also refreshing to allow her the opportunity to entertain herself without my constant involvement.
That being said, I am just beginning to use materials such as Slow & Steady, Get Me Ready by June Oberlander (thanks to Stephanie’s recommendation), which has wonderful weekly activities for ages 0-5. I have noticed that it assumes your child can walk at one year, week 1, which is really not that realistic for Karis right now, so I have starting back in the 0-1 category.
Just yesterday we sat down and played with different containers and lids and talked about taking the lids off and on, and which lids go on which containers, and allowing her to take them off and on. This activity was working on such skills as matching, eye-hand coordination, learning to follow instructions, etc. She really enjoyed it, but again, only lasted about 10 minutes. It was a fun learning activity, and this book is full of simple activities like these.
