The goal of Pathways for Preschool is to cultivate your child's love for learning. With the flexibility of choosing the order and amount of activities, you can adapt your teaching to meet the needs, abilities, and developmental level of your child. With this flexibility, you can also take advantage of "teachable moments" to naturally expand your child's interests and knowledge. Pathways for Preschool brings you and your child together for simple, fun, and purpose-filled hands-on learning!

 

Theme and Focus

Pathways for Preschool is organized into twelve monthly thematic units. Each unit starts with a page that details the unit's focus and suggested field trips that correlate with what your child will be learning that month and special days (such as having your child dress in pilgrim attire). The units correlate with each season if you start in August.

See a lesson plan overview >>> here.

 

Learning Centers

In the introduction (p. xii) of the teacher’s edition, you will see a section labeled “Centers.”  Since this program is also incorporated in preschools, the centers are suggested areas for preschool teachers to create in a classroom setting. As a homeschool family, you do not need to create the “center" areas! You already have easily accessible items and areas throughout your home that you can use for these activities.

A simple way to incorporate these centers is to download and print the Centers PDF found >>> here. This printout lists the lessons and the suggested activities in which the "centers" would be used. You can use this printout to help you prepare for upcoming activities.

 

Here is a sample of some of the simple activities listed on the printout:

Lesson Number	Page Number	Activity
12	82	Supply modeling clay for your child to make dog bone cookies.
23	150	Provide items for your child to role-play a doctor.
33	218	Read Goldilocks and the Three Bears.
57	493	Set up a tepee and encourage your child to go inside and look at books.
82	648	Provide lids and different-sized gift boxes for your child to match.
102	773	Provide a penny for your child to color over and make impressions.

 

 

On the days when a center activity is suggested, you can adapt it to items and areas already located throughout your home. For example, if you do not have a small teepee, your child might enjoy making a blanket fort or setting up a small tent in your backyard. It would also make sense to substitute Play-Doh for modeling clay.

 

Along with the fun and laughter you experience together through these suggested activities, your child will benefit in the following ways:  

Art activities: Increase creativity and observation skills, improve memory and imagination, improve hand-eye coordination

Block activities: Encourage creativity, help your child compare size, weight, and shape

Home Living/Dramatic Play activities: Improve Language and social skills through role-play and acting out real-life situations

Letters/Numbers activities: Help your child develop fine motor skills, number recognition, and letter recognition

Manipulatives/math activities: Improve sorting, sequencing, counting, and cutting skills

Science/Sensory activities: Cultivate investigative and observatory skills

 

Administering the Lessons

Each week consists of five lessons in the teacher’s manual. The lessons are divided into sections that look like recipe cards. When selecting activities from these “cards,” choose activities that will work best for your child. Select whichever activities from the first two lessons you would like to do on days one and two. Select whichever activities from the next two lessons you would like to do on days three and four. Each week ends with you reading the story from the “Tales Around the Barn” section and completing your chosen activities from the recipe cards suggested for day five.

Alternatively, you can rearrange your schedule for two-day, three-day, or four-day completion by selecting activities to complete during your planned number of days.

 

Lesson Features

Each activity “card" is color-coded and labeled with a title. Each title has a correlating feature. Some "cards” are also marked with a picture of a triangle to indicate that an advanced skill is required for all or part of that activity. You, as the parent, know your child better than anyone. Therefore, you are best equipped to determine your child's readiness for each activity and can select which activity “cards" you would like to do with your child. Brief descriptions of the lesson features on the activity "cards” are listed below.

 

 

Skills: Summarize the lesson focus

Let’s Discuss: Encourage expansion of vocabulary and knowledge while promoting conversation

Rhyme Time: Develop language skills

Sing with Me: Sing songs with your child, or if the song is marked with a star symbol, play the song from the Hoppy Tunes CD.  (The Hoppy Tunes CD is included in the textbook kit.)

Happy Habits: Develop manners, good habits, social skills, and relationship skills

Let’s Discover: Increase observation skills

A-B-C Time: Learn letter recognition, phonemic awareness, and print awareness

Yummy in My Tummy: Incorporate hands-on experiences such as cooking and snack preparation

Let’s Create: Enhance creative expression, motor skills, and hand-eye coordination

Look Up, Look Down: Develop an understanding of position words and opposites

Colors Are Fun: Learn colors

1, 2, 3, Go: Develop number recognition, counting, sorting, patterning, classification, and sequencing skills.

A Hop, Skip, and a Jump: Develop motor skills and understand directional terms

Tales Around the Barn: Develop listening and comprehension skills

Once upon a time: Develop listening skills, print awareness, picture reading, dramatization, and visual memory

Activity Packet: Reinforce lesson skills with a worksheet from the activity packet included in your textbook kit.

 

Extra Reinforcement and Resources

Visuals

Appendix visuals are found at the back of your teacher's manual on pages A85-A117. They enhance lessons through visual pictures. The lessons that they correspond to are listed at the bottom of each page.

An optional visual packet, sold separately from the textbook kit, includes shapes, colors, nursery rhymes, alphabet cards, number cards with pictures on the back, sequencing cards, and math manipulatives. 

 

Reproducible Coloring Pages

In the back of the teacher's manual (pages A14-A84), you will find pages that you can copy for your child to color. These coloring pages enhance the skills and concepts that you teach in the lessons. The lessons that they correspond with are listed at the bottom of each page. Copy these pages as needed.

 

Calendar

You can use a calendar of your own to point out each day and talk about the day’s weather. You can also enhance your conversation by drawing a picture of a cloud, sun, rain, or snow on each calendar day.

 

Precursive Alphabet and Numbers

BJU Press has developed a precursive alphabet that makes it easy for children to form letters within one or two strokes. This eliminates confusion on where to put lines and circle shapes in relation to each other. Furthermore, since most of the strokes are administered the same way in the cursive alphabet, when the time comes for your child to learn cursive, the transition from writing precursive letters to writing cursive letters will go smoothly. Learn more about the idea and philosophy behind the BJU Press precursive and cursive handwriting >>> here.

 

All of my children have learned how to write with the BJU Press precursive alphabet and could read cursive before they learned how to write it. The handwriting program gave them great comfort in printing the precursive alphabet. They transitioned to cursive writing without anxiety. The precursive alphabet is introduced in the Pathways for Preschool with letter recognition, and precursive handwriting is incorporated through grade 2. Page A13 of the teacher's manual shows the precursive alphabet. You can also download the BJU Press precursive font for practice >>> here.

 

Bible Action Truths

Bible Action Truths (located on pages A2-A4) are valuable for starting conversations with your child about their actions and attitudes.  It lists biblical principles and includes Bible references so you can easily delve into Bible study that is applicable to your child's daily life. Your child will be able to understand biblical concepts as you discuss kindness, love, and other principles of behavior. This treasured resource has given me the opportunity to have valuable discussions with my children about biblical principles and behavior. 

 

In Conclusion

With the BJU Press Pathways for Preschool, you can help your child develop a love for learning while they play and learn with you. Gain confidence as you work with your child and enjoy the many years ahead of you as you witness the growth of his heart, the development of his good character, the building of his faith, and the advancement of his knowledge and understanding.

See our YouTube video to see what the materials look like: https://youtu.be/yngddHMyWjU