Last night on Blog Talk Radio I had a great discussion with Lynnae and Jenn about frugal homeschooling. One topic that came up in the discussion was homeschooling your preschooler / kindergartener.

Many people are concerned about the costs of homeschooling, but homeschooling in the younger grades can cost next to nothing. One of my favorite books for preschool is Slow and Steady Get Me Ready which costs under $20 at Amazon and is even cheaper used. This book lists over 250 activities for you to do with your child from birth to age five. If you need ideas of what to do with your child this book can help guide you through the process of working with your child at home.

If you don’t need a formal curriculum for your younger students, what do you need?

First you need books, and lots of them. Big books, small books, books with lots of pictures and books with lots of words. Reading to your children is one of the best gifts you will ever give your children. You don’t need an extensive home library either. Your local library probably has enough books to get you through the initial years of homeschooling.

If you tire of reading aloud, try audio books or books on CD. This is not a substitution for reading aloud, but rather a way to supplement it. The other benefit is that children will sometimes be able to listen to books that are way above their “reading level.” One of my 6 year old’s favorite audio book last year was The Old Man and the Sea. He requested this book before bed almost every night for several weeks.

Help your children learn their letters and sounds by creating the alphabet in play-do or drawing it in shaving cream or sand. Many younger children learn best when they can “feel” what they are learning. Take a letter a week and create activities around that letter. Find items around your house that start with that letter. While driving encourage them to look for the weekly letter on road signs and billboards. The possibilities are endless.

One tip when teaching your children to write is to teach the lowercase letters first. Most of our writing is done in lowercase letters so it makes no sense to teach them uppercase until they are writing their lowercase letters well.

When it comes to math the preschool and kindergarten skills are very basic. Counting, number recognition, ordinal numbers are some of the skills you will want to work on during the early years.

Counting is probably the easiest to teach, since most children love to count anyway. Find opportunities to count items around your home, as well as when you are out. For example your child could help you count how many apples you are buying at the grocery store, or how many stop signs there are in your neighborhood.

Number recognition can be taught by exposing your children to numbers in every day life. Point out numbers on your house, speed limit signs, or prices at the grocery store. You can also work on a number a week and create activities around your weekly number.

Ordinal numbers can also be learned in a very natural setting, because what preschooler doesn’t want to be first? I used Little People or counting bears to help demonstrate ordinal numbers to my kids.

Games, puzzles, dress-up, and outside play are also important pieces to an early childhood education. For most children these activities are part of their every day life anyway, so incorporating them into your school day will be a very natural process.

The most important tip I have for homeschooling your preschooler/ kindergartener is to relax and have fun! Children are little sponges and eager to learn and participate when they are young.  No one gets into college based on their kindergarten report card so relax, create an environment where learning is an adventure, and enjoy your children this year.

This post is linking to Works for Me Wednesday and Frugal Friday.