Home Daycare Lesson Plans

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Are you in need of home daycare lesson plans that meet the needs of teaching a range of ages? Are you looking for lesson plans that don’t cost an arm and a leg? These free lesson plans are for you to help in running a home daycare!

Home daycare has unique challenges and gifts that make it different than any other kind of teaching. But many home daycare providers still want to do learning activities with their kids that will give them a great start for school readiness, even though they serve a wide range of ages.

If you need some quick ideas that you can prep in 5 minutes or less, check out these home daycare activities. 

You will find many activities that are geared for home daycare providers with limited budgets and space and no helpers. There are still so many fun things you can find to do with your kids.

Lesson plans for home daycare are not impossible to figure out. Click on the highlighted link to find out how to easily plan out your days with your kids.

Lesson plans should help kids develop fine and gross motor skills, have messy and non-messy choices, include games, and stimulate children’s sensory development as well.

Daycare curriculum

The curriculum should promote social skills, music appreciation, creativity, critical thinking, and language development. Promoting literacy is important as well as math and science skills.

Get ready for lots of learning and fun with these lesson plans including themed units and special activity days that reinforce different subjects you can teach about. Some activities require a little bit of set up, but all are easy enough that I have done them with my home daycare students.

These are fun, play-based activities that can be used with infants, toddlers, and preschoolers.

Check out these 5 minute games for daycare to add to your lesson plans! And don’t forget to check out these printable activities.

Infant lesson plans

• Summer fun water party ideas will help you throw a super fun water party for any age child.
• Check out over 30 garden activities for kids of all ages.
• Even young infants will enjoy a circus party in your home daycare.

Toddler lesson plans

• Science activities for toddlers and preschoolers will give you ideas to use with kids in different subjects of science.
• Polar animal activities for kids can be used with any age and teaches about the unique qualities of animals that can survive in severe cold.

• Enrichment activities such as these daycare lesson plans on Picasso are a lot of fun. You can teach art as well as enrich children’s learning about culture and Picasso’s works.
• For more fine arts ideas you can study Frida Kahlo in this daycare lesson plan.
• Studying classic literature through the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a great way to teach kids as well.
• You can also throw a camping party for kids to teach them all kinds of fun skills and it goes right along with Huck Finn.
• Another classic literature piece you can study with your daycare is The Secret Garden. Lots of fun things to do with that theme.
• Throwing kids an educational shark party is not only fun but super full of education for kids about an animal that is super interesting and special. You could also make these mermaid bookmarks to go with it.
• The all about me dance party article gives you tons of ideas to celebrate the uniqueness of each child. Similarities and differences are an important part of learning self-awareness.
• Use these ideas to throw a really fun dinosaur party for your home daycare kids.
• What about a terrific teddy bear picnic? All ages of home daycare kids will love that.
• Or fun elf on the shelf ideas!

Preschool lesson plans

• Fall activities for preschool will give you lots of ideas for exploring leaves, apples, and pumpkins.
• Gardening and plant theme for preschool will teach kids about life cycles, botany, and more.
• The pumpkin preschool theme will teach kids about different ways to explore pumpkins.

• Dental health theme for preschool is a fun way to help teach kids oral hygiene and get them excited about brushing their teeth.
• Caterpillar and butterfly theme will teach kids about metamorphosis and more. And the butterfly life cycle theme will teach them as well.
• The summer fun theme for preschool will give you tons of great ideas to use in summer.
• Special holidays such as valentine’s day are a great way to teach about friendship.
• Consider throwing a zoo party to teach kids all about animals.
• Don’t forget fine arts and enrichment with these Daycare Lesson Plans on Shakespeare.
• Dr. Suess day is a super fun one to celebrate with home daycare lesson plan ideas.
• One of the most fun days we have is every four years when we do a summer Olympics theme. It’s great for teaching patriotism, determination, and much more.
• Learning about kindness and creativity is a snap when you use Daycare Lesson Plans on “Anne of Green Gables” with your kids.
• These art enrichment Daycare Lesson Plans on Jackson Pollock are lots of fun!
• Or study the weather with these Daycare Lesson Plans on Wuthering Heights.

We have super fun art parties at Little Sprouts and the kids love buffing up their creativity.

In addition to these themes, check out the blog for tons of recipes to cook with kids and other great activities. Check out this recipe for dandelion jelly that kids would love to make. There are different kinds of activities such as:

• painting activities
• gardening with kids
• composting
• building a terrarium
• ladybug facts
• praying mantis facts for kids

There is so much to do with your home daycare on this blog!

I’ve been doing home daycare for over 25 years and I still love it every day. My theory is you should keep them busy or they will keep you busy, so I do just that in my home daycare. I love letting kids have free play and we do a lot of that. We are generally play-based.

I also think that parents appreciate the special activities you do with kids and the kids do enjoy it. So I try to make a balanced mix of teacher-led and child-led activities so they can get the best of both worlds.

It’s helped me be successful all these years in my business, but the best part of all is having parents come back and tell me that the teacher raved about all the things the kids that leave here know. That’s the true sign of success for me. My kids are confident, prepared, and ready to learn.

If you are interested in premade lesson plans for other themes, check these out at Daycare Time Solutions. They have great monthly themed lesson plans AND other great products to help you with your home daycare.