Easy Circle Time Ideas for Preschoolers to 8 Years Old
We have a special time almost every school morning where I work on Bible memory, song memorization, and other memory work with my young children. There are many ways to do Circle Time, so come check out if this is the one for you!
A couple of years ago when my oldest was 2-3 I came across the concept of Circle Time through Jady A.’s YouTube Channel. I love her videos and have watched a lot of them, and while we now do things our own way, that was where I first found my inspiration and still use ideas from.
I write this from the perspective of a homeschool mom, but this system would work just as well for others such as preschool teachers. It’s a great way to get memory work done!
So every morning when we are ready for the school day I call the children together. Sometimes we are in a circle on the floor, and other times we just gather wherever we do our school work.
Through the last several years that I have been doing Circle Time, we have changed how we do it to meet the needs of my children at each stage, and it will likely keep changing.
Circle Time might not work the best for older children, but now it is still something that works well for us and we all enjoy. Here are some of the basics of how we do it.
Our Circle Time Box: Section 1 (Songs and Poems to Review)
We have a special index card box where I keep all our circle time cards. At the front I have a card with my daily plan that I write out at the beginning of the year.
We often start our school day with a cheery “Good Morning”, and a prayer for God’s guidance, patience, clear minds etc. Sometimes I also read a Bible story from a Bible storybook to the children. You could use anything such as a good morning song to start your time together.
After that we start going through our circle time box activities. You can find a link to similar index card boxes on my shop page.
In the first section I have all the songs and poems that we have memorized, with the newest one that we are working on at the front. We go over that first one first every day.
Once we know it from memory, I stick it in the back of that section and make a new one or get out one of the new ones I have stored and waiting in the next section.
Next, we review the next couple of cards depending on how much time we have or how long the songs/poems are. If our memory is a bit rusty I keep them in the same place to review a couple of days, and if we know it well then it goes to the back of that section. That way we are constantly reviewing and rotating all the cards we have already learned.
Section 2: New Songs and Poems
As I mentioned, the second section has a bunch of cards with new songs and poems I want to work on in the future. If we ever get caught up and I just make new cards as we need them, then that section would not be necessary.
Here are some examples of our cards in the first two sections. I do use both sides of the card (marked with a 1 and a 2) to not end up with so terribly many cards.
If the songs are short I just put down the title. For longer songs I might write down the first word or two of each stanza as a memory prompt, or mention where I can find the song if we forget too much.
For poems, I often copy down the whole thing on the back just so we can remember if we forget, and so I don’t have to go look them up. At this stage I want my children to learn to sing so I do a lot more songs than poems, but it is enjoyable to stick in a few poems as well. For some poems we do simple rhyms with finger plays.
Section 3: Verses to Review
For us as Christian parents, it is very important that our children memorize from the Bible. We don’t want to do it in an overwhelming way or under pressure, especially not at these young ages.
That is where I love my circle time box for these things at this stage. We can take a break from Bible memory in school vacations, but still consistently learn and review our verses from year to year.
Section 3 of the box holds the verses we are learning and reviewing. Sometimes we go through any passage we want to learn. Since we also live in a Spanish country I want to learn the Spanish verses for some common Bible passages.
Other times we use the Abeka Bible Memory Picture Cards or the Abeka ABC verses cards. We really enjoy them.
Our girls don’t feel the pressure that they have to get something memorized, but their sharp little minds pick up each new verse after a few days of repeating it, and then I add a new verse and we review those that we have learned..
Section 4: New Verses Cards
I got some of the ideas for Bible memory from Simply Charlotte Mason, and then tweaked it to fit my needs at this stage. But if you check them out they have a really nice system, as well as free verse and card divider printables.
Maybe eventually if my children acquire a whole bunch of memory verses and get into different stages I will use their system and get each child their own index card box.
My New Verses section includes the unlearned ABC verses cards and Simply Charlotte Mason cards I hope to eventually learn. Again, I have a whole bunch, but if we learn them all and I get to the place where I just add a new one whenever needed, I can eliminate that section of the box.
Section 5: Basic Skills
The final sections of my circle time box have various random skills I want my children to learn, and that they aren’t learning in their school books necessarily.
When I see something that needs to be worked on, such as their manners, safety instructions, etc. I put that down on a card with some prompts about what to talk about. We always work on the newest one and then review and rotate the learned cards, just like with our verses and songs.
Some things I have worked on also include learning the continents and ocean’s names, and other fun things like basic sign language, family birthdays, phone numbers, Spanish vocabulary, social skills, etc.
It is fun to hear them singing the continent song “North America, South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, kangaroos hop in Australia, and penguins waddle in Antarctica,” from memory to the tune of Jesus Loves Me. They can point on a map where each continent and ocean is, and best of all they will know it easily by heart, with no pressure, when they come to that in their school books.
Another favorite card of mine has been the Safety one. While I hope my girls never need that information, I like to have the chance to talk about what to do if I get hurt, they get lost, or there is a fire or an earthquake. I try to teach them a bit about using my phone to call their dad, or 911 if need be.
You can use this section of your circle time box for whatever skill or knowledge you wish to go through with your children.
Final Circle Time Box Section
The final section of my box includes future skills I want to teach my children when I have a chance, as well as empty index cards that I may need in the future.
I hope this inspires you to enjoy some circle time with your children. For these ages all this doesn’t take us more that 15-20 minutes a day. We have our family devotions and study the Bible in school, but in the future I might include Bible study or missionary biographies in our circle time too. Really, you can adapt circle time to whatever your family’s needs and preferences are!
What do you do for Circle Time or memory work with your young children?
If you enjoy reading more about homeschooling with young children, check out our Homeschool Routine and Setup or our First Day of Homeschool for this year. Be sure to also check out how to teach your child to read.
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Find links to index card boxes, index cards, and dividers in my shop page.
I do a morning basket routine every morning which includes some of these elements. I really am inspired by your index card box method! Thank you so much for sharing!
Glad you stopped by!