The key to a successful home preschool year is to plan. I am the type that loves to write out my lesson plans on paper. It helps me organize my ideas and keeps me focused on what needs to be taught. Today I’m excited to share with you my new weekly preschool planner that I’ll be using with my 4 year old preschooler this school year!
I like to plan out my week on Sunday and gather all the materials I need for my lessons that week. Here’s a look at what the sheet looks like. Here’s a little bit of what we do for these subjects:
Circle Time
I have a lot of home preschool moms ask me how to do this, especially if you only have 1 child you are homeschooling. I think circle time is an awesome way to start out the preschool day. It becomes a routine and helps the child understand that this is how the school day starts. If you have older homeschooled kids, it’s a good way to do something all together. I still recommend doing circle time even if you only have 1 child.
Here is what we do for circle time:
- We start with a morning song. I also like to do songs with movements or fingerplays.
- Then we go through the calendar and weather charts. We review over the letter of the week, practice counting together (by 1s, by 5s, or 10s), and do simple patterns with counting bears (AB, AABB).
- Then I do a read aloud. I sometimes do the read aloud that goes along with our language arts lessons or sometimes it’s just a book that I think would be great to read to my preschooler.
I would like to add in this idea of a morning message like this on on Pre-K Pages. If you would like to read more about circle time, I recommend reading this article on 10 Tips for Circle Time.
Language Arts:
Language arts cover the areas of listening, reading, writing, and speaking. For preschoolers, that means doing activities with the alphabet, listening skills, phonics, rhyming words, and handwriting.
Math & Science:
Preschool math consists of counting, colors, patterns, number recognition, one-to-one correspondence, shapes, sorting, graphing, money, ordering, matching and subtitizing.
I like to do experiments and hands-on activities for preschool science. We usually do 1 activity in either math or science during our preschool day.
Motor Skills:
Motor skills are for fine motor (small movement) and gross motor (large movement) They are both important to work on! Building up fine motor skills will help with holding a pencil and handwriting skills. We don’t do both every day, but we try to.
Sensory Play:
Exploring the senses is so important for preschoolers. Sensory bins are a great way to do this. You can also create sensory bottles or other activities engaging the senses.
Process Art or Crafts:
I do process art activities or crafts about 3 times per week. Process art are open-ended art activities. There is no final product, just whatever art your preschooler comes up with!
These are the subjects I plan out. I also make sure we have plenty of time to play outside, do learning games, field trips, and read lots of books! I just find that if I plan out our week for these subjects, I feel more successful. (You’ll notice in the picture above that we don’t do formal school on Wednesdays. It’s up to you on how many days you feel like you need to do school. I recommend between 2-4 per week with preschoolers.)
You can download the printable HERE.
I also want to share a few sample schedules for ages 2, 3, and 4-5. 2 year olds are very young to start formal preschool, so I only do 1 main activity with them (either alphabet or math). Here’s what the schedules look like:
Have a wonderful school year!
Your website is seriously AMAZING! I have a 2 1/2 and 4 year old old “my 4yo is in head start” my daughter was in early head start her teacher would come once a week but she got a new job so her teacher is no longer coming and Iv decided I would really like to start teaching her myself “bc why not🙂” she’s eager to learn and explore and she does better while she’s doing those things so this is amazing!! We’re also very tight on funds so the fact that most of the activities and things can be pretty much found around the house “if not they are very cheap for materials”. This is my GO TO the only website iv found that really resonates with me and what I’m looking for PERFECTLY! my son had even jumped in and loved the activities on days school was canceled! Love the weekly planner I printed it on cardstock & laminated it! Just use ultra fine tip dry erase markers and BOOM can erase if I change my mind or mess up and reuse the next week!!
Aww thanks so much! I appreciate your kind words! I’m so happy to hear that they love the activities on my blog! <3
thank you so much!!!! As a SAHM to 2 boys, (3 and 1) and very limited income, I worried about getting my sons ready for school. I found your site 3 days ago and tried the dry erase numbers, and the name on bottle caps as I had all the materials in my house. My 3 year old loves it! And my husband and I were very happy that you shared so many great and cheap ideas to help us out. I am excited to try all the other ideas too! Thanks
Great! So happy to hear this!
This has been so helpful to me especially during this pandemic! My son will be 3 in June. I’m trying to figure out what should I focus on throughout the week with him. I want to work with him concerning alphabet, color, number and shape recognition.
I just came upon your page while researching how to teach my preschool grandson during this pandemic of 2020. He has been taken out of preschool until this is all over and I am watching him while his parents work. I have no idea what I am doing and your page has been so helpful to me. Thank you so much for putting this information out there to help those of us who are lost right now.
I am so glad to hear my blog is helpful! I pray you are staying safe and that this pandemic ends soon. Blessings to you!
I am doing the same thing.
I am over an Early Childhood Education Center in our school district. This is a lab class where high school students come and receive hands on learning with children in a child care setting. We serve children whose parents are district employees. As part of our curriculum, we complete assignments for their CDA portfolio. I would like to use your free printable weekly lesson plan form for an assignment. Would this be possible?
I love your site!
Hello! Yes, that would be completely fine! Thanks for asking and your kind words!
This was such a great find for me. I’m a Spanish teacher in the afternoon for 45 minutes and I work with both 2, 3 and sometimes 4 year olds and it can be very difficult to find activities that all the age groups can enjoy. I can implement certain activities and adjust them to how I see fit. So thank you.
Is there any way I could download your lesson plan template and allow it to be editable? It is darling!
I’m sorry, but this one is not editable. The one I have for sale in my store is! You can find it here: https://teachingmama.org/product/printable-preschool-planner/
Thank you so much fo for the lesson plan printable. Im taking CDA courses and this came in handy.
I was just going to make myself a planner and you have saved me from taking the time to do it. Thank you! I love your sample schedules too.
Jodie @ Growing Book by Book recently posted…Teaching Kids to Be Responsible Through Literacy Activities
I’m so happy to hear that this helped you out!!
love reading through your stuff- what are “quiet boxes” that you mentioned in the 4 year old rest time?? may need to move to something like that but wanted to know what is all about and how its used. Thank you!
Hi Laurie!! Quiet boxes are a box full of items to play with during rest time. I share how to make them and what to put in them in this post: https://teachingmama.org/quiet-time-boxes/