Calendar Board

I have mentioned that I want to do a post about our morning routine - and I will! But, one of the biggest aspects of our morning routine is our calendar board and I figured it deserved it's own post.

About two months or so ago, I filmed a video showcasing our calendar board which you should definitely check out:

Now, I finally am getting around to writing a blog post about it, and actually it's probably good that I waited as now I can tell you what has changed and how it's been working for us. 

First of all, we use a homemade calendar board made from a 3' by 2' bulletin board that I bought at Walmart.  This ended up being the perfect size as it fits our calendar and has room on the side and at the bottom for our other daily items.

It currently sits in our living room on top of a shelving unit, the top is also used for our nature/holiday/seasonal table.  This is all stuff that I allow E to move around freely and decorate as she wishes.  It did hold leaves and pine cones from our nature walk but has since all been tossed out.  Now it just has our pumpkins and harvest decorations until it's time to decorate for Christmas.  (I'll probably Instagram post the change in a few weeks).  

The main component of our calendar board is obviously, our calendar!  I picked this up at a local teaching supply store, it came with the calendar backing (the bit with the squares and days of the week), the date cards, and monthly cards, as well as a few holiday cards.  I used velcro sticky dots on the top frame and the back of the monthly cards to adhere them to the bulletin board for easy switching.  (Watch my video to see what that looks like).

We are currently using this cute little butterfly jewelry charm attached to a key ring to mark the date.  It's very easy for E to move the key ring over every day.

Below our calendar I created some pockets out of colored construction paper and attached written labels for the days of the week.  For the current day we stick a popsicle stick labeled 'today' in the daily pocket.  I would eventually like to add sticks for 'yesterday' and 'tomorrow'.

On the side of the board at the top I have created a bunch of nursery rhymes typed and mounted to colored construction paper for us to practice memorizing (I'm trying to incorporate the Charlotte Mason memorization idea into our routine, and figured nursery rhymes are a good place to start). I switch it out when we get bored, or need a change.  Below that I have a typed list of the months of the year, this it to help E switch out the monthly headers for our calendar.  

Next to that is a pocket with a few Brain Quest cards (I cut them all off the rivet they are attached to and include about 2-3 of them in the pocket), I will ask E the questions and keep the cards in the pocket until she knows all the answers, then I switch them out for new ones.  It works great as I don't have to come up with my own questions, they are fun and colorful, and there is a good mix of ones she knows the answers to already and ones she doesn't.

Below that I have a typed up card that says "the season is..." and below that are seasonal cards that I printed for free from From ABCs to ACTS.  

Next to that is a card I typed up that says 'the weather today is...' with cards that I printed for free from Easy Peasy Learners.

If you watch the video, you'll notice I changed a few things in the months since we started incorporating calendar time into our daily routine.  First off, I added the nursery rhyme and took off the letter of the week card.  This was mostly because I find ways to display the letter of the week in other ways.  E REALLY enjoys the music/dance/rhymes part of our calendar time so I think it's working out better.  I'm also really trying to get her to work on remembering/memorizing simple things.

I also had originally started out using velcro dots on our daily numbers and just adding a new one each day, but I found with the larger numbers E didn't know which way they went, and she also had trouble sticking them to the board (she has to align the dots on the back of the card correctly for it to stick, and because the cards are solid it was hard to know where the dots were) and this ended up just frustrating her. So I ended up trying pushpins and so far it has been working out fine.  At the beginning of the month I have her hand me the numbers in order (as high as she can count) and then I push them onto the calendar.  So far she hasn't tried to pull them out so it hasn't been an issue.

Anyway, I hope this post has been helpful to anyone who wants a relatively inexpensive way to incorporate a calendar board to their routine.