I love setting up an environment where my young preschool aged children (and older children as well) can be engaged in play based learning. I do this by setting up lots of little centers in every room that encourage creative and imaginative play with a little bit of skill based learning thrown in there as well. This is basically a Montessori approach to learning where children are given a lot of choice in a resource rich learning environment that incorporates plenty of opportunities for guided instruction.

While being a stay at home mom and raising our four children (after being an elementary school teacher for 7 years and getting my Master’s degree in Linguistics), these are the learning centers that have worked for me and have helped all of our children learn how to read at a young age, develop curious and imaginative minds, and get ready for school. (Check out some resources I created to help young children learn how to read here.)

Before I dive into the learning centers, I wanted to set the scene with a few tips and tricks that have helped my learning centers to be successful.

Tips and Tricks

1. Little Learning Centers: Set up small tables, little chairs, small couches, and other areas that are easy to access for little ones.
2. Organization: I love using baskets, bins, cardboard boxes (with the flaps cut off), and tubs to sort and organize my toys and supplies. I like to label things when I can as well.
3. Children’s Choice: Introduce children to new learning centers, but after introductions are made, let them choose what they want to do. Follow them and provide guidance and support wherever they choose to be.
4. The Way to Start Your Day: Start the day with the most learning intensive projects first. You’ve got maybe an hour or two after they wake up for optimal attention, so use your time wisely!
5. When to Pack it Up: If I have a center set up (like a Play-doh or a water table center) that’s really messy, but doesn’t sustain their attention for very long, I will pack it up. I’m usually okay with cleaning up a big mess as long as it was really and truly worth it. *With a new baby on the way, I’m starting to pack away all centers that make a big mess, just to help me manage things a little better. 🙂
6. Rotation: If a center isn’t getting used, I’ll pack it away. Then, when I take it out again later, it’s like a brand new toy all over again! (If they still don’t use it, I’ll just get rid of it.)
7. Routines and Procedures: Having a good behavior management system in place will make the day run much more smoothly. I have found both as a teacher and now a parent, that most behaviors can be managed with consistent routines, procedures, and expectations.

Whether you are setting up an atmosphere for homeschool or just looking to create a stimulating learning environment for your little one(s), these learning centers are sure to engage, stimulate, and provide hours and hours of play based learning opportunities for your child(ren). Also, keep in mind that we have four children ranging in age from 21 months to 7 years, and they ALL enjoy using all of these centers to varying degrees. 🙂

Here is a little video of me showing most of the learning centers we have set up in our home.

1. ABC Magnet Letters

Learning the ABCs isn’t just about singing a song, it’s about learning BOTH the letter names AND letter sounds really really well. Doing so will lay a strong foundation for reading.

This ABC magnet letter center is a perfect way for little ones to explore what they are learning about letters in a fun and hands on way. *Watch a video of Ophelia using ABC magnet letters here. 

Materials Needed:

• Magnet Letters: I like these foam ones the best (120 pieces, capitals and lowercase letters), but they are currently only available from third party sellers on Amazon. These would be pretty good too if you don’t mind the pastel colors. I do like the Melissa and Doug wooden letters (52 pieces, one capital and one lowercase for each letter), but the magnets separate from the wood after time. This set of 240 lowercase letters (blue consonants and red vowels) from Lakeshore Learning is also a really great teaching tool, but the letters just aren’t as fun for kids to use. I like using it more for a teaching tool or to set up a lot of words at once. If you look at my letter set up, you’ll notice that I like setting the magnet letters in a shallow box so that little fingers can easily dig through them. Don’t worry about sorting the letters out, they’ll just get mixed up again! 🙂 I also like having these Leapfrog ABC letters for the refrigerator.
• Muffin Pans: I like using this 2 x 3 pan for learning three letter words, this 12 muffin pan for either three or four letter words, and this mini muffin pan for longer words (and counting practice).
• Magnetic White Board: There are lots of different options here. You could get a larger white board to hang on the wall, mini white boards to fit on laps, or a standing white board. It all depends on your needs.
• Small Table: You don’t really have to have a table (the floor would be just fine), but it does make it more fun! I made this mini table (pictured above) using scraps of wood we had lying around, and I measured it specifically to fit this funny little place in our “homeschool room”. When I was a teacher, I liked taking the lower parts of the table legs off from my rectangular tables to make a lower work surface for kids, and they loved it!

*For more of my favorite ABC resources, check out my blog: 10 Best Resources for Teaching the ABCs.

2. Counting

Learning how to count lays the foundation for math like learning the letter names and sounds lays the foundation for reading. It can take young children a very long time to learn one-to-one-correspondence (meaning that each object represents one thing, so it is definitely a good idea to encourage children to count often.

In the picture below, you’ll see that I have a mason jar numbered and labeled. I used to have 20 or so different counting jars with different things in them from beans to legos to small cars, but these counting bears were always the favorite, so that’s all I use now. 🙂 *The Investigations math curriculum is great for teaching math concepts in a fun and exploratory way.

I like using anything that encourages counting like the game Connect 4. Not only is this good for counting, but it’s good fine motor skill practice for little hands too.

Materials Needed:

• Counters: These are the counting bears that I like to use.
• More Counters: Lakeshore Learning has TONS of great counting resources. Check them out here.
• Mason Jars: These wide mouths jars are best for storing the counters.
• Muffin Tin: I like using this mini muffin tin to practice counting and for my ABC Magnet Center too.
• Connect 4: This Connect 4 game is a great way to practice counting (we usually go to 20).

3. Drawing

I really like having one table in the house set up just for drawing. This table is in our homeschool room, and I always have coloring books, workbooks, how to draw books, printouts of favorite things to draw, stencils, paper, crayons, markers, other office supplies like scissors and tape, and a little box for finished drawings laying out and ready to use.

Not pictured to the right is a tall bookshelf that I keep stocked with a variety of coloring and work books, mini books we have made, blank mini books ready to be filled, extra markers, and more supplies. The pencils here in the picture below belong to our 7 year old daughter Ruby. She LOVES drawing and can be found doing one project or another here at this table every single day.

Materials Needed:

• Coloring Books: I like collecting coloring books and workbooks from garage sales, thrift stores, and trips to the grocery store based on whatever our children are interested in.
• Crayons, Markers, Pencils: These are the pencils my older daughter loves. They are kind of expensive, but really good quality. I really like having this pencil sharpener too.
• Paper: I get paper scraps from my parents’ business and cut it up for drawing paper, but blank computer paper like this works well too.
• Printouts: I like going to Google and typing in “free coloring pages” and then whatever my kids are into like monsters, princesses, Dora, or the ABCs. I have a cool storage rack like this that I hang on the wall to hold available printouts for children to grab.

4. Painting

Yes, painting is messy, but soooooooooooo much fun for kids! Having a bunch of painting supplies on hand and ready to go makes for a really fun project.

I like letting kids draw whatever they want when we paint, but sometimes I’ll paint with them and we’ll talk about different things to paint like the sky, flowers, trees, cats, or whatever! If I’m feeling really artsy, maybe we’ll look up some famous artists someday and try to mimic their work.

Materials Needed:

• Tempra Paint: Lakeshore Learning has some AMAZING painting resources like these tempra paints, or you can get them from Amazon.
• No Spill Paint Jars: These no spill paint jars from Lakeshore Learning and corresponding paint brushes are just pure brilliance. You can also get them from Amazon.
• Smocks: Something like this would be great, or even an old button up shirt would work fine too.
• Painting Paper: If you want to go the extra mile, this painting paper is really nice and doesn’t bleed through as much as printing paper.
• Easel: We just use our homeschool table, but if you have the space a really nice painting easel would be really fun.
• Other Fun Painting Tools: Finger paints, painting dots, watercolors, sponge designs, glitter glue, and tempra painters are all great additions to any painting center.

5. Arts and Crafts Box

I love collecting things from garage sales, thrift stores, or the crafting aisles at Walmart to fill my craft box. I like to put most things in plastic bags and label them. It’s really fun to just take out the whole box, and get crafty!

Materials Needed:

• Craft Box Items: Pom poms, little googly eyes, artificial flowers, buttons, sequins, glitter, pine cones, headbands, cotton balls, shells, pipe cleaners, paper scraps, yarn, and ribbons are some of the things I have in my craft box.
• Glue: Glue sticks are nice for paper things, but you’ll want Elmer’s glue for bigger things, and maybe even a glue gun if you want things to be really permanent.
• Paper: Sometimes it’s nice to make things on paper, so I like to have an assortment of large and small blank paper as well as construction paper.
• Craft Ideas: I like letting the kids make whatever they want, but sometimes you need some inspiration or a pre-made kit like this headband kit or this bracelet kit.

6. Cutting and Gluing

Cutting is a really hard skill for little hands to master, and so any opportunities for young children to cut and glue will help prepare them for kindergarten. Sometimes it’s fun to just cut shapes out of colored paper and glue them onto large pieces of white paper. Other times, it’s fun to just cut and cut and cut! 🙂 One thing I’ve noticed though is that if a child isn’t ready to cut, don’t push it.

Materials Needed:

• Scissors: I like having an assortment of simple kid scissors, some nice adult scissors, and crafting scissors (like the ones pictured above).
• Paper: I like having an assortment of construction paper, blank computer paper, and large sheets of paper. I also like to cut the edges off from a rectangular shaped box and label it “paper scraps” so that we can save our paper scraps and use them to practice cutting.
• Glue: I LOVE having tons of large glue sticks around, as well as several bottles of Elmer’s Glue. I find that I can get the best price for glue sticks on Amazon, but I always shop the back to school sales for my Elmer’s glue and stock up!

7. Stickers and Stamps

Stickers and stamps are a really fun way for kids to be creative, work on vocabulary and language skills, and develop their fine motor skills. I like to let the kids have complete freedom and do whatever they want with stickers and stamps, but sometimes they need a little help getting started. When this happens, I just get out my own piece of paper and think aloud as I choose what stamps to use and how to arrange my stickers. For extra vocabulary practice, I like to write descriptive words underneath the stickers or add word bubbles to the characters.

Materials Needed:

• Stickers: I haven’t found anything I like better than the Melissa and Doug sticker packs. We usually buy them in the toy aisle at our local grocery store, but you can get the blue sticker collection, the pink sticker collection, the alphabet activity pack, and the fashion sticker collection online too. Priddy Books has some good sticker collections too.
• Reusable Stickers: While these can be a bit difficult to keep organized, the kids LOVE them! My kids have enjoyed this fairy, princess, dress up, and house bundle, this adventure collection, this vehicle collection, and this face collection by Melissa and Doug. Peaceable Kingdom also has some great reusable sticker collections like this zoo, ocean, and mermaid tote.
• Stamps: You’ll want a bunch of stamp pads like these, and I have been able to find most of my stamps at garage sales and thrift stores, but you can buy these nature stamps, pirate stamps, or fairy princess stamps online. Hero Arts has a really good collection of stamps for all occasions.
• Paper: I like using large sheets of paper like this, but you could also have fun with a fancy sticker book like this. Compassion books are great ways to save stickers and stamps too. I like buying them in bulk during back to school sales. I also really like buying huge rolls of paper to use for a variety of things.

8. Write On/Wipe Off

Write on/wipe off boards are such a novel thing that it makes writing really different and fun. It’s a good way to give your child guided practice as they start to learn how to make lines, shapes, letters, numbers, and more.

Materials Needed:

• Write On/Wipe Off Books: I have tried many different write on/wipe off books, and the Wipe Clean Books by Priddy Books are by far the best. I like the Uppercase Alphabet, Lowercase Alphabet, Tracing and Pen Control, and Numbers.
• Dry Erase Markers: I like having an assortment of large and small Expo markers. You can get some with an eraser and cleaning spray, but on old sock put on a child’s hand works really well (and is fun) too. I also like keeping them in a pencil box like this.
• White Boards: You can get a small lap white board, a large wall hanging board, a small desk easel, or a kid’s easel. I like to get white boards that are magnetic so that I can use them with my magnets too.

9. Water Play

I usually save my water play centers for the dead of winter when we really need something to liven things up. It can get very messy, but kids LOVE it, and hey, it’s just water. When my water centers are in motion, I pretty much constantly have a load of towels in the dryer. 🙂

A less messy option is to just do water play in the sink, or better yet, in the bathtub! There have been many long winter days where we take a bath in the afternoon just for fun!

Materials Needed:

• Cups and Saucers: There are many different types of tea sets that are really fun to pour with, but sometimes larger cups are fun too.
• Tubs and Buckets: It’s nice to have a tub or bucket for collecting the water and another for pouring into. I like these rectangular dishpans a lot.
• Water Table: I did buy this water table last winter, and it was a lot of fun, but not really as fun as the tables with cups and saucers. In the summer we keep it outside, and that has been fun, although a bit of work to keep clean.
• Towels: I like keeping a stash of old towels hanging near the water centers.

10. Cars and Trains

Our youngest son Julian (21 months) is absolutely OBSESSED with anything that has wheels. All day long he loves pushing his cars and trucks. At the end of the day, there are little areas of cars and trucks everywhere. It’s adorable!