Fresh ideas please!

[JoeMax]

I need some fresh ideas for keeping my 3 year old busy while I do school with my 5 year old. Typically my 3 year old does school with me for about 45 minutes to an hour a day, and my 5 year old does school for about 2 and 1/2 hours a day. We take little breaks of course, and while I am focused on my 5 yo I try to give my 3 yo some fun tasks like stringing beads, coloring, sorting coins, stuff like that. But I'm running out of ideas and my 3 yo is getting bored lol. My 5 yo is very easily distracted, and then hard to get back on track, so, coupled with a bored 3 yo our school week has not been very productive so far lol. I could really use some ideas to keep my little one occupied.

[romacox]

How To Home School With  Babies and Toddlers (& Love It)

[swim-mom72]

sensory buckets may help

• one filled with rice or beans and they find hidden objects
• one filled with a little bit of water and some floating boats
• one filled with sand and they can draw in it or drive little cars through it
• ......you get the idea : )

[oredeb]

 well i teach a 5 yr old and theres a 3 yr old running around! hahaha

i have both of them sit with me at the table one on each side of me, and we do our school work, and the younger childs learns that he has to wait till im done with sister before  i can help him sometimes, its hard at first cuz he wants my attention but i just remind him each time and now he waits(most of the time) till im done with sister, he goes in spurtz, sometimes he loves to color with markers, sometimes its cutting paper, sometimes its scribbling on paper, pasting stuff together, things like that. oh yea he loves to follow dotted lined stuff!  it works for us this way, and if he gets tired of sitting there he has stuff he can play with in the same room, but hes learning for that 1 or so hour im sitting there with them he must cooperate!

and sometimes he'll stop what hes doing and just listen! i know hes picking up on lots of schooling while hes with us, i had one of my kids learn how to read by just doing that!

[JoeMax]

Thanks for the ideas! I think I will add a few sensory boxes to our classroom and see if that does the trick. Love getting new ideas to help inspire me!