She’s Baaaack

Call us crazy, but Entrepreneur and I have agreed to have Twix come back to our house during the weekdays while Mama is at work. Last August, when Entrepreneur was in the throws of oral chemotherapy and life was more unsettled than normal, we all decided it might be better if Twix went to an actual preschool for her last year before kindergarten.

One was found that was affordable and in a convenient location. It was housed in a church and we were told it was a daycare but had a Pre-K program. After a few months, we found out that, while being run by very nice women, it was not facilitated by an actual preschool teacher. Although Twix was doing well, she was not learning much above and beyond what she already knew. Everyone complimented her on how advanced she was and how well behaved she was in class….which was awesome. But the question became, why are we paying Pre-K pricing if it’s primarily a daycare program? Sort of defeated our purpose.

So, as of last Monday, she’s back at Nana & Papa Preschool. Yes, I know how crazy that sounds since I lamented on Monday all the things I have to get done in the next few weeks. Perhaps I can incorporate parts of my to-do list into some sort of learning activity for her.

Fortunately, being the pack rat I am, I’ve saved a truckload of some educational items from years past. When our girls were young, we had almost every age-appropriate Discovery Toy item in the catalog. Many of them have survived periodic purges and are being called into service once again. But, now they’re considered “vintage” toys.

Nana & Papa Preschool has its share of phonics and writing activities, but also incorporates lots of play. This vintage 1991 “toy” is designed to match objects and shapes by wrapping the string around the base to solve the question. Some are easy, some require abstract thinking. We also have these “wrap ups” in addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Twix can easily do the abstract set marked for 6+, so we’ll be moving up to the abstract set for 8+ shortly.

A more recent educational toy at our house is called Imagination Magnets from Mindware. As you can see, it’s manipulating geometric shapes to create pictures of things. Of course, we have a Discovery Toy version that predates this concept, but this one is a favorite of both Twix and Peanut.

Twix also has an electronic LeapStart with interactive activity books so I think we have about everything covered for core academics, spatial reasoning and science. And we have books….oh so many books! Being a pack rat does have its perks.

Most of all, we have the opportunity to continue to play with our grand girl in such a way to get her ready to love learning, as well as making lasting memories. And for that we’re truly thankful.

Playing along with Thankful Thursday, hosted by Brian’s Home.