Helping your young children transition to staying home

Becoming a full time mom is not only a big transition for you, but also your young children. They are used to getting up in the morning and going to spend the day at daycare. There they would have a schedule of activities, meal times, and nap times. It is important that you maintain a similar schedule at home although you don't necessarily need to be as rigid as a lot of daycare facilities are. It is mostly important to establish a regular pattern to your day. Continue to wake your children in the morning and do everything as you would normally do in preparing them for a day outside the home. Encourage your children to play as much as possible each day. Children learn through play and ultimately you are going to want them to be ready for school. Encourage age appropriate activities for each of your children. If you have a three year old you may want to consider dedicating a portion of each day for what is known in my house as "school time."

My three-year old son loves "school time" and he knows that when his baby sister takes her morning nap that it is time for mommy to be the "teacher" and we work together on different activities so that when he is bigger he can go to "regular school." You can find a lot of information on school readiness curriculum on the Internet. Also, there are some great resources out there for different craft projects that are fun and educational for children. Below is a list of some sites that will help you on your search for planning these activities each day.

Another consideration for young children transitioning out of daycare is that they likely had friends that they enjoyed playing with. It is important to let your little ones develop social skills prior to entering school. If you are like me, all your friends work during the day so a good place to start may be a local church. Often they have a preschool programs that are only for a couple hours a week and are fairly inexpensive and many times you don't necessarily need to be a member of the congregation. This would also give you some time to run errands and take care of things around the house while you don't have to worry about your little one. If that is not an option, scout your neighborhood, perhaps a couple blocks over you will see a young child out playing with their parent. Another place to try as long as weather permits is a local playground. While the weather is nice, your child may make a friend or two there and you could also make a new friend yourself.

Another thing that seems to be springing up here and there are child "gyms." These facilities are usually indoors and have a variety of equipment similar to a playground and they may offer tumbling classes or other fun activities for your young child. You probably will not be able to drop your child off but it sure beat the hell out of sitting on a freezing park bench in December. Also many times these places are tacked on to adult gyms...so while your toddler gets his or her workout you could grab one too.

Try to plan your days so that you are home in plenty of time for naps and meals. There is nothing worse than dragging your kids all over town only for them to fall asleep in the car and not want to continue the nap once arriving back home. This usually leads to irritable children right at dinner time which is no fun for anyone.

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