We took a break from Tot School this past week because of our travels. I had every intention to type up another Tot School-related post in its place, like how I plan for each week or how I keep my activities organized, but that will just have to wait for another day. I'll just enjoy this past week for what it was, a few days off :-)


If I've said it once, I've said it dozen of times, and I'll say it again: Tot School can be as scheduled or as flexible as you want it to be. Some thrive on schedules and some feel too confined with schedules. There are advantages to both schedules and being flexible and you just have to find that happy, functional place for both you and your toddler. Schedules and routines are good for anyone, no matter your age. However, I wouldn't want anyone to feel like a failure as their child's teacher if things don't always go as planned. It might be Thursday before you ever get around to doing some structured activities with your toddler and THAT'S OK. Who says you can't keep the fun going through the weekend? What's important is that you decide what's best for your family. It might mean that you don't have any school related stuff on the weekends. Maybe it means you reserve the fun crafts and art activities for the weekend. You can have Tot School 3 days a week, 5 days a week, or a little bit every day of the week. It's up to you and I hope that produces a sigh of relief :-)


I have to say that this week has been one of my favorite weeks so far in the alphabet. There are just so many cute ideas for activities involving fish and frogs.

It's no surprise that we had to include Goldfish crackers for snack this week. It was truly a lovely coincidence that the grocery store with a lot of exported goods started selling them again. I've kept an eye out for them on the shelves for the past several weeks to no avail. You can imagine my excitement when I saw those delicious, cheesy fish on the shelf just in time for this week. The grocery store even had the colored Goldfish crackers, which meant we were able to play this goldfish color sorting game:



Little Man had a lot of fun sorting his goldfish into the right bowl. However, it IS a little hard to distinguish between the yellow and the orange, even for ME. Even so, Little Man did a great job and enjoyed snacking on the fish as he played. You can go visit Celebrate Every Day with Me to get your free downloadable copy of this game!

I was pleased to find out that we already had a nice collection of books to go with the theme of the week:

A song I found myself singing a LOT throughout the week was "5 Green and Speckled Frogs". I made this cute little activity to go along with the song and it gave Little Man a way to participate. I got the idea from this blog and you should definitely go check it out too! She's a librarian with lots of other cute activities, songs, and story time plans.


To make the little frogs on a log, I used 3 toilet paper rolls (only because I didn't have a paper towel roll) and 3 sheets of 8x11 colored card stock paper (green, brown, and blue). I also printed out the frogs onto the sheet of green card stock paper. I turned the brown sheet of card stock horizontally and measured out 5 strips, each 2.5" in width (DON'T CUT THE STRIPS OUT YET). For the water, I kept the sheet of blue card stock in the vertical position and measured a strip 1" in width and cut it to be the length of the paper. Then, I turned it horizontally and hand-drew some waves. I cut out the strip of waves and glued it right-side up onto the bottom of the pre-measured brown strips. Next, I cut the strips out. At this point, you can either go ahead and glue the frogs onto the top of the brown strips (same side as the waves, also right-side up) or wait until you've wrapped them around the roll. To secure my strips around the "log", I simply stapled the ends together.


To get some exercise and motor skill practice in, we practiced jumping and leaping from one lily pad to the next. All I did for this activity was cut out about 10 green circles to scatter around the floor. We jumped, leaped, took giant steps and regular steps as we traveled from one lily pad to the next.


One activity we didn't end up doing, but I hope to still try out with Little Man really soon, is painting on aluminum foil. In case you end up having time, here's the link I found that has some helpful tips for this art project.





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