How To Have Family Home Evening With PreSchool Age Children

Although it can seem difficult to organise anything with a two or three year old, children this year actually thrive with routines and structure. Holding regular family home evenings will help for your young children to feel included and important, will help them to learn important information and life skills, and will help the rest of the family to feel involved with and affectionate towards them.

The first thing to keep in mind with this age group is timing. The same child can be charming just after breakfast in the morning, but an absolute nightmare if kept awake during naptime. You know the times of the day that your child is happiest. If possible, try to hold your family time during one of their happy times. If the commitments of other family members means that the time must be at another time, try to get your child to nap at a different time that day, or to get them to rest another way, so that they will hopefully be happy for your family time.

Secondly, preschool children have short attention spans. Don't expect your child to sit still for an hour-long family discussion. The key is not the length, but the quality, of the time spent. Try to keep the entire family home evening to about thirty minutes with kids this age.

Next, don't underestimate the capabilities of two and three year olds. Yes, children this age love to play, but they are also excited about learning. Include a short lesson. This could be a religious lesson, such as how to pray, gratitude, or the creation story. Keep it simple and in terms that a two or three year old can understand. There are a lot of really great picture books that can help with this. There are a lot of great resources on the internet, including the LDS online nursery manual. Make sure to keep it interesting. Tell it like a story, use pictures, play music, etc.

This can also be an important time for non-religious teaching. Children can be taught manners, such as the importance of saying please and thank you. Preschool age children are becoming more aware of the world around them, and beginning to understand more complex ideas. For example, they are beginning to grasp the differences between boys and girls. This can be a good time to discuss this, and learn about body parts (You can use your discretion on how much you want to teach on this one. Take your guide from your kids; what have they started asking questions about or pointing out?). Preschool age kids are first learning about numbers, and their speech is developing rapidly. They are also improving in coordination.

The next important thing to remember is to keep it fun. After your brief lesson, do something together that they will enjoy. Try to make it related to the lesson so that it reinforces what they learned. For example, after a lesson about nature, plant a seed together. Give them a picture to colour related to what they learned. Although some children will be too young, many three year olds are ready to start playing colour games like Twister and Candy Land.

Finally, enjoy a yummy treat together.

With a little planning, family home evening can be a great time to really bond with your preschool child, and to help them to be happy and confident.