Hi. I'm new to PBS and loving it so far! Wish I'd found it YEARS ago! :) 

I'm mom to two boys, aged 3.5 and 2.5, and we're homeschooling. I'm looking for reccomendations on web-sites, books, or just ideas for activities to do with two VERY active little boys, indoors, when the weather is bad. Funny, but it's one of those things where I think of great things all the time, except when I need them! :) So I've decided to get organized about it and put together a notebook. Thanks for your help!

They might enjoy Starfall - it's free:

www.starfall.com

JC

You might want to look at books like

The Preschooler's Busy Book: 365 Creative Games and Activities to Occupy Your 3-To-6-Year-Old by Trish Kuffner

or

Slow and Steady Get Me Ready by June Oberlander

They both have games and learning activities for younger kids.  I have a 2.5 year old, a 3.5 year old and a Kindergartner.  My 3.5 year old likes to do either a preschool workbook or a wipe-off type book to practice writing letters while her big brother does "school."  My 2.5 year old doesn't do anything formal yet, but he does like the Leap Frog Fridge Phonics toy. 

Here is my advice:

• Get yourself a good craft book. One that uses household materials is awesome.
• Hit the dollar tree stores for cheap workbooks if your child is so inclined to use them. My 4 year-old loves her workbooks.
• Invest in manipulatives: legos or other blocks, playdough (I make my own)..anything they can use to express themselves while learning.
• download some Raffi songs (or other kids' folk music) and move, move, move
• Make a list of goals that you will accomplish by preschool's end. Mine includes knowing phone number and address, days of the week, months of the year, the alphabet, and much more.

See links for schooling below for activities (all links to free websites) and links for books for free audio books that you can download.  :-)

Cloi,

I have several websites that I use for my youngest (5)...who is still doing preschool work.  He is severely dyslexic and (we think) also has some sensory processing problems, so we're going extremely slow with him, knowing that he will catch up in his own time! :)

Universal Preschool has some GREAT ideas and some free printables.

Donna Young is absolutely AWESOME in her free printables.  There is so much to be gleaned from this site, you will come back to it time and again as your homeschooling progresses through the years.

Kidzone is another one I frequent simply because I can find things by grade or by topic.  :)

Plus if you Google "free coloring pages' you will find a TON of hits to choose from that you can add to your favorites.  My boys are always wanting to color with me and so we read a story or talk about something fun and then color a page together that I find off the internet.  They LOVE it!

Welcome to PBS! We aren't homeschooling full-time (my 4.75 year old attends a preschool co-op three afternoons a week) but I do supplement  with our daughter a lot at home. One of the things that we both really enjoyed was using the book "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" by Siegfried Englemann. I started working with her just after my daughter turned 4 and we both really enjoyed that cozy time together. Best of all, we now have another reader in the family. ;):

hi, i'm new. just found this topic. i am a grandma now. but homeschooled my own kids in Pa.

anyway, thought i would mention an excellent resource book for creativity for kids. it's called "Kids Create" well worth the money. but if your budget is tight, every month they feature a new activity on their website and that's free.

glad to meet you all and thanks for letting me share.

Hi Wanda,

It's nice to meet a homeschooler from your generation. :) Welcome to our humble home.

Hi. It's me again. The one who started this thread. First, I want to thank everyone who has replies so far. What a bunch of great ideas! Thank you so much! So far, every one of the links has been extremely helpful! (I especially like universalpreschool.com!) And I now have a list of books on my reminder list for when I have the credits to get hem! :)

We just started to officially "homeschool" our 3.5 year old. He's enjoying getting into a routine and enjoys it when we do "school". The 2.5 year old, of course, is not really into this idea, but I try to sit him at the table and let him watch and color and participate when he can. So far, so good. My oldest son has really been enjoying some of the art projects I've been finding from your reccomendations, and today I'm going shopping for some more art supplies!

Wanda, it is inspiring to hear from someone who's been through it all before. Thank you for your post! I'm sure we all have days when we think we must be insane for homeschooling. It's nice to know that we can live through it and eventually get to be grandparents! :)  I'm interested in looking at the web-site you mentioned, but I couldn't find it doing a search. Could you post the URL?

Again, thanks to all of you who have responded. And to anyone just finding this thread. I'm always looking for more ideas! I used to be a regular classroom teacher, back before I had kids of my own.... The first rule all good teacher learn (and this includes homeschooling moms!) is don't reinvent the wheel if you don't have to do so! Look for other ideas and STEAL, STEAL, STEAL! :)

I just had to mention Barbara Curtis' site. Barbara was a Montessori teacher before deciding to homeschool her own children (She has 12). Her books are fabulous, and her website is a plus to go along with the books:

MommyTeachMe

Michele