The first time I heard my friend say she was making a busy binder for her son I was intrigued. I wasn't exactly sure what it was but when I saw her idea come to life I knew it would be the perfect solution to help keep Leona busy (get it 😉) while I worked from home during the quarantine months AND help her learn and strengthen her skills before heading to school.
It's simple really. It's a binder filled with activities to keep your toddler or learner busy. I have had a lot of questions on where I got it from and the secret is.. I made it!- just like my friend did for her son. With an idea of what it was, what I wanted to do for Leona, and some pointers in the direction of resources from my friend I was off!
Everything I put together was from the website totschooling.net. They have a lot of free teaching/learning resources available to parents and teachers. I will link specifically the ones I put together for Leona below but you can totally make this whatever you need it to be for your kiddo and their needs. Leona is a quick learner and I'm sure over time I will want to make some updates to this so that I can keep challenging her. I looked through all of the resources though and started with the basics.
I found included tracing pages (something she needed a LOT of practice with when I created this early in 2020), color recognition, shape recognition, name recognition, name tracing, animal matching, number matching, and shape matching. Since I created this I have seen leaps and bounds in her development within these areas and she can now write her name independently without her tracing pages. This makes the teacher in me so happy! Even better, she has asked to use this book and work in it nearly every single day since I made it.
Couple things you will need for this project:
binder- I let Leona pick out what color she wanted to make it special for her!
printer/print shop where you can print out the pages
3-hole punch
velcro dots
laminator
dry erase markers
scissors
patience 🙂- the worst part about this is the assembly and prep but once you create it it will last forever!
When you go onto totschooling.net there are so many resources so depending on your kiddos age you may want different materials. They are sorted by age groups -toddler, preschooler, and kindergartener. They also have themed and holiday items so you can keep changing this up for your little one.
These are the things I printed to add to Leona's binder. You can put them in any order however this is also the order I put them in.
After printing all of this out it will be clear there are some items you have to cut out. This is the tedious part. Cut out all items necessary (I did this before laminating everything). After everything is cut, send all pieces and full sheets through the laminator. This is not required however it will hold up so much better. Then you will have to cut the pieces again (only if you put multiple items in the same laminating pouch). 3 hole punch all of the full sheets. And lastly, add velcro dots to the pages and pieces and stick them together. There is something about velcro and toddlers- they just love it!
Put it all in the binder, and get your dry erase marker ready and your little one will be off! Hours of fun and learning- which is any mama's dream!
Hope all of you moms out there loved this one and found some inspiration to help your little loves!
xoxo
Maria Elizabeth
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