2 year old preschool daily schedule: My Perfect Schedule for 2-Year-Olds

Daily Schedule for Children 2-4 Years of Age

View the Latest COVID-19 Updates from the Office of Head Start

Families can use this sample daily schedule to plan a flexible and consistent routine for their preschooler while learning at home.

Download the PDF

7–7:30 a.m. Wake Up Routine, Including Toileting and Breakfast

• Good morning, families! Think about all of the important things you do every day for your family. You are exactly the parent your children need you to be right now.
• Most children show interest in using the potty between 18 months and 2 years of age. When you see these signs (dry diapers, your child noticing when their diaper is full and expressing their discomfort, an interest in sitting on the potty), it is time to start practicing toileting.
• Provide your child with a daily visual schedule and teach them how to use a timer to promote independence. All children, including children with disabilities, benefit from predictable routines.
• Keep in mind that children learn throughout the day during typical daily routines. So even though you might set aside specific time to work on an Individualized Education Program (IEP) or other specific learning goals with a teacher or special educator, your child is learning throughout the day with endless opportunities to practice new skills!

7:30–8 a.m. Independent Play and/or TV or Other Screen Time

8–8:15 a.m. Choose My Clothes and Get Dressed

• Provide a few clothing items and allow your child to choose what to wear for the day.
• Use words and encourage conversations during self-care routines. For example, “Do you want your blue shirt or a green shirt?” or “I have two socks, what about you?”
• Social stories can be helpful when teaching your child self-care skills. You can find social stories online with images to download and make your own book, or you can create your own social story by using photos of your child going through the routine (i. e., photos of your child getting out of bed, brushing her teeth, combing his hair, etc.).

8:15–9 a.m. Planned Learning Experience or Activity

• Join an online activity with your child’s teacher or home visitor, or select a planned learning activity suggested by your child’s teacher or home visitor related to your child’s learning goals.
• For children with an Individualized Family Service Plan (IFSP) or Individualized Education Program (IEP), use technology to work on IEP goals with your child’s teacher. IFSP or IEP goals and objectives may not be your child’s preferred virtual learning activity, so it’s important to mix preferred and nonpreferred activities to increase engagement.
  • For example, write the name of each activity on a Popsicle stick. Each Popsicle stick would have either an activity to address an IEP objective or a preferred activity such as “Imitate your favorite animal” or “Show your teacher something from home. ” During each virtual meeting, your child can choose a Popsicle stick until all of the activities are done. When you add some fun, children are more willing to engage with the nonpreferred activities.
• See this resource for guidance about virtual IEP meetings and home visits.
• You can also try using a “first-then” schedule:
  • “First we’ll read a book, then you can play on the tablet.”
  • “First get dressed, then we can watch a show together.”
  • “First I need a break, then I can help you.”
• Recorded videos can also help reinforce IFSP or IEP goals. For example, a child may be more interested in trying out adaptive equipment after seeing a peer using the equipment. This video illustrates how video peer modeling was used to support 2-year-old Nelcy to start using a walker and ultimately walk without it.

9–10 a.m. Interest-Based Play and Exploration

• Choose an activity from materials and resources sent to your home by your child’s teacher or home visitor. This will extend learning for your child based on his or her interests.
• Make sure to include movement breaks throughout the day.

10–10:45 a.m. Outdoor Time or Active Play

• Go to the playground or backyard or take a walk around the neighborhood.
• Dance to music, practice yoga, or try other movement favorites.

10:45–11 a.m. Toileting or Diapering Time

11–11:45 a.m. Lunch

• Add conversations to lunch and other mealtimes. Use pictures or photos to start the conversation. Take turns and include other family members.

Noon–12:30 p.m. Story Time and Book Reading

12:30–2 p.m. Rest, Nap, or Quiet Play Time

• Children 2–4 years of age need 11 to 13 hours of sleep each day, including naps.

2–2:15 p.m. Toileting or Diapering Time

2:15–3 p.m. Outdoor Time or Active Play

• Go to the playground or backyard or take a walk around the neighborhood.
• Dance to music, practice yoga, or try other movement favorites.
• Reach out to trusted friends and family members via phone or online video calls to spend time with children as a special afternoon activity. For children with IEPs, this can include working on IEP goals that don’t require physical prompting.

3–4:30 p.m. Independent Play with Your Child’s Favorites

• Create an activity bin of things your child can do safely on their own. Have your child help you choose things to put in the bin.
• Your teacher, home visitor, early intervention provider, or special education teacher can give you ideas for activities to include that will also support your child’s specific learning goals (including IEP goals).
• Take advantage of outdoor time to work on learning goals, including those in IEPs for children with disabilities. For example, practice counting while jumping or hopping. Practice following directions by following active directions like “run to the tree, touch the ground, and hop to the swing set.”
• Make simple treasure hunts for the yard or house. Give child a visual list of toys or items to find.

4:30–5 p.m. Dinner Prep and Help and/or TV or Other Screen Time

• Phew! That was a busy day of caring for your child. Remember to make time to take care of yourself each day, too! Exercise regularly, eat healthy balanced meals, and get plenty of sleep. Breathe deeply, stretch, or meditate.

*For children 18–24 months of age, this schedule or the schedule for 12–18 months may be useful, depending on your child’s readiness and development. Families can also choose elements of both to best meet their child’s needs.

Read more:

Parents, Distance learning, COVID-19

Teaching Practices

Resource Type:
Publication

National Centers:
Early Childhood Development, Teaching and Learning

Last Updated: March 15, 2022

THE BEST HOMESCHOOL PRESCHOOL DAILY SCHEDULE

How to create your own perfect homeschool preschool curriculum and activities schedule for your 3-year-old? Try out our super simple and easy to edit Homeschool Preschool Planners!

Homeschooling a preschooler can be so easy and fun! It’s super easy to keep things organised with our best homeschool preschool daily schedules and planners! We created them for our 3-year-old preschooler and it worked great for us with 2-4 hours daily preschool activities.

The Ultimate Homeschool Preschool Planner and Materials

These printable covers basically everything you need to organize your homeschool preschool from scratch. Plan thoroughly – from Homeschool requirements, homeschool styles, preschool ressources, homeschool supply list, preschool weekly themes, preschool activities, preschool goal tracker, checklists, daily routines at home, visual lesson plan to a entire dated Homeschool Preschool Calendar Oct 2020 – Jan 2022! Everything is included!

Try this super useful planners and get 20% off with a Discount Code 2021!

The Perfect Simple

Homeschool Preschool Planner

is our super simple easy homeschool preschool planner, schedule and materials.

But first things first.

What should I be teaching my 3 year old?

If you ask yourself, what should I be teaching my 3 year old? The answer is pretty simple, the basics are

1. Literacy:

• Letters: Recognition, Sounds, Tracing, Writing
• Spelling
• Reading

2. Math & Logic:

• Numbers: Recognition, Counting to 20/30, Tracing, Writing, two of the basic mathematical operations adding and subtracting.
• Basic Shapes: Recognition, Tracing, Cutting, Sorting, Classifying
• Memorization

3. Motor and Sensory Skills

• Gross Motor Skills
• Fine Motor Skills
• Sensory

4. Practical Life and Social Skills

Additionally and very important, you should add to your daily routine, easy, daily practical life activities that develop your child’s

• Personal skills
• Social skills

5. Art, Music, Science, Social Studies

And last but not least, try to include fun art, music, science and social studies activities on your daily schedule according to your child’s interests and talents. Use their natural curiosity and just try to answer every single question they ask. Even though at some point it seems that all they want is just asking…

The Best Homeschool Preschool Schedule

Why is this the best homeschool preschool schedule? Very simple. It’s custom made.

We give you a great simple structure and you can modify the content according to your time, child’s needs and talents. So, you make sure it’s a perfect fit for you and your child.

So, how to use it? Let’s get started in 4 simple steps:

First things First: Plan your homeschooling year

To keep things simple, start with the annual planning templates. You don’t need to fill out everything and not at once.

Remember, homeschooling is a learn-as-you-go process. Choose 3-4 resources you and your child like (books, online, educational videos, preschool activities, games, apps) and use their materials as a start.

For example, we use Khan Academy Kids, National Geographic Kids, Pete the Cat Books, Penguin Young Readers and our own activities.

To keep things simple, I planed 36 weekly themes in advance according to the season and what’s happening in the world. For our schedule, I tried to consider important events and celebrations and of course made sure to include special weekly themes for the numbers 1-20.

For example in the Labour Day week, all of our activities are about jobs, work and occupation. We chose an education system theme around the International Teachers Day and will talk about preschool, kindergarten, school and college. Around the World Mental Health Day, we will have an Emotions Theme and learn how to concentrate on positive emotions and deal with negative ones. And so on and so forth.

Follow your daily routine and add every week something new, so that your little learner can easily remember what you have learned together and get excited to learn something new.

KEEP YOUR PLANNING FLEXIBLE AND AGILE ENOUGH TO RESPOND TO CHANGE!

Don’t over-plan and over-schedule. You’ve got this! Relax and have fun!

Homeschool Preschool Goals

As a next step, set your monthly homeschool preschool goals. Add preschool activities continually based on your child’s interests. Learning is only effective when it’s memorable and fun. If an activity is engaging for your child, then great! Add it to your activities list, write down a short activity description, so you can use it easily for your weekly planning.

In order to plan your activities better, you can use the two editable templates – Preschool Activity Description and Preschool Activities List.

The overview helps you to make a short description of each preschool activity – incl. materials needed and instruction. You can also add an image and make some notes.

You can put your favourite activities according to their category on your To-go Activities List. Every time you need an idea, you can simple check our list.

Also, try to observe the learning style of your child first and help them succeed with the right activities. I noticed example that for some areas such math Aiden like many toddlers is a hands-on learner (kinesthetic). He learned to count with his toy cars. He will put them in line and count them. So, I try to choose math activities accordingly.

I try to teach every day with every experience a positive approach to learning: We choose activities that have a beginning and an end, so we try to do them until finished. Respect your childs concentration and let them explore and follow their curiosity. This is especially easy outdoors – beach, playground or nature walks make this possible.

Encourage independent learning, not only because it’s the best way, your little ones learns, but also because independent learning frees up also your time. No need for helicopter parenting!

Choose teaching and self-correcting materials, so your little homeschool preschool can figure it out on their own!

Weekly Planning

Set your weekly goals and ask your child for their goals for the week.

Then, create your weekly lesson plan and a visual weekly lesson plan for your child.

You can also create a weekly chores chart, so your child can track their own schedule.

Daily Planning The best homeschool preschool daily schedule

Once you have all these planned out, you can plan easily your daily homeschool preschool daily schedule.

Review the evening before your daily schedule and write down your to-do list for the next day. I usually revisit it first thing in the morning. Also, have your activity supplies for the next day ready.

During the day, don’t forget to stay flexible. If your child does not like an activity you planned, move to something they like. Use your time wisely and avoid frustration. At the end of the day, fill out with them their behaviour chart. Ask them how they rate their behaviour. If they have enough stars, give them a thank you card, otherwise encouraging card.

After your day is done, use the Summary of the day template to make a short summary of what happened, what did your child learn. In this way, you easily can see instantly, what you have learnt with your little one each day. For example, we learnt today the letter B, that makes BB sound – B like Bag, Breakfast. How was the weather today? Was it cloudy, rainy, or sunny? Sunny! And do you remember which day is today? It’s Tuesday! That’s right! Which activities your child enjoyed most. And so on and so forth.

Try to keep the learning activities between 2 and 4 hours spread out during the day. The rest should be physical and practical life activities, preferable outdoors.

Homeschool Preschool Circle Time Materials

Indeed, it’s just the two of us mostly, but we still love our cosy learning in cirle time.

It’s our way to start the day and talk about almost everything. We use our over 120 pages of colourful materials to learn reading, writing and practice fine motor, story telling, problem-solving and reasoning skills.

The over 120 Pages of Circle Time Materials include:

• NUMBER OF THE DAY 1-10
• LETTER OF THE DAY A-Z
• SHAPE OF THE DAY
• COLOUR OF THE DAY
• WHAT’S THE WEATHER LIKE TODAY?
• HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY?
• DAYS OF THE WEEK
• YESTERDAY, TODAY, TOMORROW

Homeschool Preschool Schedule

You can buy this editable printable in our shop and we hope it helps you organize your homeschool preschool easily!

Happy Learning!

Daily routine of a child at 2 years old

The baby is 2 years old. He is already very smart and more independent, knows exactly what he wants, can be wayward and stubborn. Often at this age there are false refusals from daytime sleep, and putting a two-year-old child to bed becomes increasingly difficult.

Features of age

At the age of 2, a child already knows a lot and can say something, declare himself, express intention or protest. The child realizes where he is, and where the rest – mom, dad, relatives and other people.

Due to the peculiarities of the development of thinking, a child at this age is not yet able to understand the point of view of another. The Swiss psychologist and philosopher Jean Piaget called this phenomenon egocentric thinking. The child is sure that others perceive the world in the same way as he does. If the baby does not like something, and the world does not immediately do what he wants, this causes him a violent negative reaction.

At the age of two, a child can already learn a few simple rules. Any child needs rules so that he can navigate the world, begin to realize what is possible and what is not, “what is good and what is bad.” The kid will learn the rules, provided that the parents themselves observe them, act consistently and predictably.

Rules and boundaries are also important in relation to sleep. Rituals before going to bed and observing the daily routine are examples of such rules.

Features of sleep in two-year-olds

At the age of two, the norm of sleep is about 13 hours a day, of which:

– 11 hours fall at night

– 2 hours – during daytime sleep.

At this age, children can sleep up to 2.5-3 hours during the day. In this case, the amount of sleep at night may be reduced – there may be very early rises or nightly “festivities”. If you are faced with “night festivities” – the baby wakes up at night and plays or requires your attention and does not fall asleep in any way, it makes sense to reduce daytime sleep. The child is healthy, but sleeps more than 2 hours during the day? So that this does not affect night sleep – create conditions for waking up during the day – open the curtains, add household noises.

A feature of the day regimen of two-year-olds is a false rejection of daytime sleep.

But physiologically, the child is not yet capable of sustaining an entire day of wakefulness. The optimal time of wakefulness at the age of two is 5 – 5.5 hours. Therefore, it is very important to keep daytime sleep.

Reasons for false refusal of daytime sleep:

– lack of sleep

– lack of regimen

– poor preparation for sleep

– there are no formed rules for the baby to sleep

Examples of how the rules work Especially when it comes to sleep.

After all, being awake is much more interesting than sleeping! He can whine, be capricious and beg. Do whatever it takes to stay awake.

If the parents agree and allow the child to go play or watch cartoons instead of sleeping, the child receives the information that the rule “you need to sleep during the day” is unreliable and can be violated.

Watching cartoons is much more interesting for a child, so next time he will reproduce the pattern of behavior that helped him achieve what he wanted. An example, the baby resisted, cried and did not want to be in the crib, and mom or dad took him out of there and put him behind a cartoon or gave him toys, he will form an associative logical chain – to get what you want, you need to resist and cry. So parents involuntarily reinforce crying, protests and refusals of sleep.

To avoid this, it is important to form clear rules and be sure to follow them yourself!

For example:

• Quiet time mandatory every day
• the child must stay in his own crib for at least 1 hour
• baby in pajamas ready for bed
• silence in the room, without cartoons, toys and active games
• curtains closed
• Parent can be present if child has not yet learned how to fall asleep on his own

It’s hard for a 2 year old to learn too many rules. Do not confuse the child, 3-4 rules are enough. These can be:

– rules for going to bed,

– rules for organizing wakefulness (for example, helping mom clean up toys),

– rules for brushing your teeth after eating

Diet

At this age, the child is already completely switching to a common table. Breastfeeding can be continued at the request of the mother, but there is no longer a physiological need for it.

– Breakfast around 8 am

– Lunch around 10 am

– Lunch around 12 noon

– dinner around 18:30.

This is an approximate order of nutrition, in each case it is formed individually, based on the needs of the baby and the general routine of the family.

Any food (porridge, milk, yogurt) just before bedtime or during nighttime awakenings can negatively affect the health of the baby:

• a negative association may be formed for sleep – the association without which the child cannot fall asleep in the evening and during short-term awakenings at night
• The digestive system also needs rest and eating at night negatively affects appetite during the day
• all food is offered before brushing teeth, so as not to contribute to the formation of caries and negative sleep habits.

An example of a day regimen for a 2-year-old child

The most important thing in shaping a child’s day regimen is observing the time of wakefulness, as well as the distribution of meals and dreams.

How a child spends his waking time affects his sleep. The load must be sufficient and saturated to accumulate the desired fatigue. It is better if the greatest physical and mental activity is organized in the first half of the day before bedtime. For the second half of the day, calmer games and activities are suitable.

Approximate daily routine for a 2 year old child:

Time	Action
7.00	Lifting, feeding
7.15	Rituals for awakening
7.35	Preparing for breakfast, child helps
8. 00	Breakfast
8.25	Self-play
8.55	Joint active games
9.30	Walk
11.15	Calm educational games, reading, massage
11.45	Preparing for dinner, the child helps
12.00 – 12.30	Dinner, sleep rituals
12.30 – 13.00	Beginning of daytime sleep
15.00	Awakening, rituals, afternoon tea
15.30	Joint active games
16.00	Self-play
16.30	Walk
17.00	Calm educational games, reading, massage
17.30	Dinner preparation, child helps
18.00	Dinner
18. 30	Bathing
18.30 – 19.00	Sleep preparation rituals
19.00 – 19.30	Beginning of night sleep

Waking time

Parents often ask how it is possible to organize a child’s leisure so that it is useful and interesting for him and at the same time would not overwork him?

At the age of 2 years, a child may experience the fear of separation from his mother. Therefore, it is important to strengthen attachment, to be in contact with the child, to support his growing independence during wakefulness.

Independence during the day has a direct impact on independence when falling asleep and prolonging sleep. Try not to do for the baby what he can already handle on his own.

Attachment in the second and third years is strengthened in the format of interaction with the mother and common activities. Any games on the rug, games with finger paints, with plasticine, mastering children’s musical instruments, reading books.

Activities can be completely different, but the most important thing for the development of the baby is the interest of both the child and the mother in it. Therefore, it is important to choose such games, such activities that are interesting for the mother. So the interaction with the baby will be high-quality, deep and resourceful. If mom doesn’t like playing with blocks, it’s not at all necessary to do it “by force”, you can go to the kitchen and give the child plastic cups and saucepans while mom is preparing dinner nearby. There are a lot of formats for spending waking time, the main thing here is to find a balance and a compromise between the needs of the baby and the interest of the mother. So that mom and baby can build, sculpt, cook, create something new and amazing together and with pleasure!

Early Bedtime Sleep Schedule Frequent Awakenings

Food and Normal Sleep Wake Time

Daily routine of a 2 year old child.

Features of age

Daily routine is very important for a child. And for a two-year-old kid, a routine is necessary, as it teaches discipline, instills a sense of confidence, and also prepares for visiting kindergarten. The task of parents is to think over and organize the regimen competently and taking into account the individual needs of their child. In the second year of life, the child already knows a lot and can say something, declare himself, express intention or protest.

At the age of two, a child can already learn a few simple rules. Rules are needed for any child so that he orients himself in the world, begins to realize what is possible and what is not.

Bedtime rituals and daily routines are examples of such rules.

Sleep

At the age of two, the norm of sleep is about 13 hours a day, of which 11 hours fall at night and 2 hours during daytime sleep.

However, in each case, these figures may differ from the norm. The periods between sleep at this age are 5-5.5 hours. To determine the time at which it is time for a daughter or son to go to bed, it is necessary to monitor his behavior. Some children are tired, start to act up, while others become too excited – they start running around the apartment, laughing out loud, inventing active games, it is quite difficult to stop them at this moment. As a rule, the period of activity ends quickly, the baby abruptly becomes whiny. You need to start preparing the baby for bed an hour before the appointed time – invite him to play calm games, reduce activity. The sleeping room should be fresh.

Nutrition

Feed the baby 4 times a day with a break of 3.5-4 hours. The baby’s day regimen should line up so that after feeding there is a period of wakefulness, active games, walks, classes, after which sleep is necessary until the next feeding. It is this daily routine that will ensure the normal condition of the baby.

Walks

Walking is an important part of the daily routine. It is necessary to walk with the child in the fresh air every day, regardless of the weather and the mother’s employment. Walking time should be at least an hour. If it is cold outside, do not refuse to go out, it is better to try to dress the baby according to the weather. In winter, it can be 1 – 1.5 hours; in the warm season, walks can be safely increased to 2 hours.

Leisure

In it is important to organize your child’s leisure time in such a way that it contributes to a smooth transition from wakefulness to sleep. It is advisable to think over the baby’s activities in advance so that the active phase falls on the daylight hours, and calm games or activities precede the evening rest.

Hygiene skills

These first skills include washing hands, bathing, brushing teeth, bathing or showering before bed.

The daily time schedule is formed individually. Following the regimen forms certain rituals that discipline the baby and make life easier for his parents.

As for getting up at 5.50-6.00 am, this is the absolute norm for many kids, and if you are already starting to take your baby to kindergarten, then you will have enough time for unhurried preparations and morning rituals. If the baby shows a desire to eat, you can give him water to drink, give him a piece of an apple so as not to greatly interrupt his appetite before breakfast.

Gradually, the time of awakening usually itself shifts to a later time: to 6.30-7.00. Be patient and consistent with your daily routine, this will help your baby grow up healthy and happy.

Sample schedule:

• 7-00-7-30 waking up, morning washing, brushing teeth, dressing;
• 8-00-8-30 breakfast;
• 9-00-10-30 creative activities
• 10-30-12-00 walk
• 12-00-12-30 lunch;
• 13-00-15-00 daytime sleep;
• 15-00-16-00 calm games at home;
• 16-00-16-30 afternoon tea;
• 16-30-18-00 walk;
• 19-00-19-30 dinner;
• 19-30-20.