Do you love the idea of doing tot school at home with your toddler, but overwhelmed with the planning part? I’m sharing some quick tips on how I brainstorm tot school themes for my daughter along with 12 themes we plan to explore this year!
In this post, I plan to cover:
- what is tot school?
- monthly vs weekly tot school themes
- how to brainstorm tot school themes
- 12 tot school themes we’ll be using this year
What is Tot School?
There’s a lot of definitions floating around about tot school, mainly due to the fact that it isn’t an official thing. The gist? Intentionally exposing your toddler to early learning skills.
Tot School can be viewed as preschool for the 3 and under crowd and tehre are many approaches to what that looks like.
There’s basically 4 main tot school styles I’ve seen:
- Worksheet/Printable based
- Activity based
- Sensory-bin based
- All of the above
While I don’t necessarily agree with all of the styles out there, I loved the idea of creating a plan for me and my daughter to explore early learning concepts together, at home. Often you will see these styles organized into weekly themes that are interesting for toddlers.
However, weekly themes require a LOT of planning and left me feeling overwhelmed trying to come up with a year’s worth of topics.
The goal, for me, was to create a framework that would lean into her interests, emphasize practical life skills and allow more time connecting with my daughter. I knew I wouldn’t be able to achieve my goal if all my spare time was spent planning activities and weekly themes.
Monthly vs. Weekly Themes
I chose to come up with themes for the month instead of for the week because it actually gave me more breathing room to explore each theme and build in flexibility all while providing consistent exposure to my toddler.
Toddlers thrive with consistent exposure. As they learn new concepts while also navigating a language they’ve only recently begun grasping, they need to see and hear and experience things over and over before it sets in.
Monthly themes support this because they provide opportunity to review, repeat, and establish a monthly rhythm.
They also help prevent burnout with planning!
How to Brainstorm Tot School Themes
Use seasons to create tot school themes
First, make a list of the months you plan to “do” tot school.
Consider if you want to do this year-round or if you want to take a few months off in the summer.
Next, dedicate 4 months to the seasons.
For example: Study all things autumn in October, all things winter in January, all things spring in April and all things Summer in July.
Now, you have four major themes complete.
Use holidays and traditions to create tot school themes
- Assign all the holidays your family observes for each month
Don’t forget birthdays or other special events like trips, or even holidays you don’t observe but want to learn more about!
For example, in November, we observe Thanksgiving, but we also have a LOT of family birthdays. November’s theme, for us, is “My Role in My Community” where we’ll explore:
- gratitude
- our neighborhood
- family traditions
- family celebrations
- community helpers (including what it means to help our own community)
Use your toddler’s interests to create the rest
Transportation seems to be a toddler crowd-pleaser and is also one of the easiest tot school themes out there.
Do you have a toddler that is fascinated with trucks but hasn’t had much exposure to boats? Do a deep dive with what is interesting to your toddler as a way to introduce them to related topics that are brand new.
If we were to do a unit on transportation, I think I’d break it down, week by week, as: trains, planes, automobiles, and boats. In fact, transportation is such a vast topic that seems to capture the imaginations of toddlers, you could probably make this topic last a couple of months if you really wanted to!
12 Tot School Theme Ideas to Get You Started
- All About Me and My Family
- Fall Harvest
- My Role in My Community
- Exploring the Five Senses
- The Winter Season
- Me and My Feelings
- Colors of the Rainbow
- The Spring Season
- The Good Earth
- Ocean Discovery
- Dinosaurs
- Habitats
Let’s Put it All Together
Here’s an example of our themes along with a few example special events
| MONTH | THEME | SPECIAL EVENTS |
|---|---|---|
| Septemeber | All About Me | Tot School begins! |
| October | Fall Harvest | Halloween |
| November | My Role in My Community | M’s Birthday A’s Birthday Thanksgiving |
| December | Exploring the Five Senses | Christmas |
| January | The Winter Season | New Years |
| February | Me and My Feelings | Valentine’s Day C’s Birthday |
| March | Colors of the Rainbow | St Patricks Day |
| April | The Spring Season | Easter Earth Day |
| May | The Good Earth | Mother’s Day |
| June | Ocean Discovery | Beach trip Father’s day Juneteenth |
| July | Dinosaurs | Independence Day |
| August | Habitats | Road Trip |
More Tot School Ideas
For more tot school themes and inspiration, follow me on instagram! I’ll be sharing some of the details to the above themes in my highlights and stories.
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