This post is part of our Happy Learning Spaces series where I invited some amazing people to show us around their inviting and inspiring learning spaces at home. With some inspiration and creativity, any corner of your home, large or small can be transformed into a perfect learning space for your children. I’ll let these friends show you how!
First up, we have… Fynn from Happy Tot Shelf. Yep, that’s me!
Show us around your learning space at home.
I’m so excited to show you all around our learning room today. It’s my children’s favorite space at home and they spend most part of their day learning, creating and playing in this room.
In this room, we have:
- learning shelf aka our Happy Tot Shelf. This is where I put up learning activities, books and toys based on a monthly theme.
- art shelf. I made a What’s on our Art Shelf video and you can watch it here.
- Lego shelf
- resource and toy cupboard. It’s a wardrobe that I used to store all my learning materials, craft supplies and extra toys I keep away for toy rotation. If you like to see how I organize my huge stash of resources, check out this video.
- my work desk
- 2 little tables, 1 floor table and 2 chairs for my children
- and a foam mat.
We live in a 2 bedrooms apartment and we are using one of the bedrooms as our learning room for now. The children are sleeping in our bedroom which is not a long term plan. But let’s just not go into the whole crazy living cost in Bay Area problem (I know right?).
What do the kids love most about their learning space?
Whenever we have a new themed learning shelf, they will be most excited about the new learning materials on the shelf. For the rest of the time, I’m guessing that my kids’ answers will be Legos and the drawing supplies for my 5yo and glue and scissors for my 2.5yo. Their favorite things change along the way as they pick up new skills or have different learning needs. Beside these materials and toys, I think my children are really loving the freedom and independence to create/learn or play with everything on the shelves throughout the day.
What makes a good learning space?
Accessibility to materials is most important to me. I wanted my kids to be able to help themselves to anything they needed (as long as they are safe for their age) for their learning and art projects. It was the key consideration when I set up this learning space. With the learning materials and art supplies organized and accessible all day on the shelves, learning and creating have become a natural part of our everyday life. The shelves themselves have become invitations to create/learn and they give my children so much independence to make art or learn anytime of the day. If my son wants to do some counting, he can pick up the tray with the counting activity from the learning shelf and work on counting on his own. If my daughter wants to cut some paper, she knows where to find a pair of scissors and papers. And I won’t have kids running to me every 5 minutes for another piece of paper. Double win.
What are some of your must-haves in your learning space?
Definitely, a shelf! An open shelf keeps all the materials organized, accessible and inviting!
THE foam mat and big trays are very close second. (Our trays are from here and here) We do all our messy art projects on big trays on this foam mat. Think of it as double bagging the mess. This, my friends, has saved my carpet SO many times from paint, dough, glitter, slime, everything!
Any tips to other parents who like to set up a learning space at home for their children too?
My number 1 tip will be to start small. If setting up a learning/art room or is overwhelming, start with a shelf. Or go even smaller, for some you, a trolley or basket with learning and art supplies will be just perfect. Give materials to your kids that you are comfortable with and present these new materials in small batches. The kids need time to learn to handle new materials and we adults also need time to manage kids with their new found materials. And of course, get a tray!
I’ll be inviting other friends to show you their learning rooms at home, so check this space often for more ideas! Do you have an inspiring home learning space too? Post a photo of your space with the hashtag #htshappylearningspaces on Instagram and tag me @happytotshelf for a chance to be featured here!
Fanny Lilyana Lim says
May 10, 2018 at 11:48 pmHi! i am one of your instagram followers. I would like to know how you keep your children’s book because I keep scrolling trying to find the bookshelves but I could not find it.
Thank you so much.
happytotshelf says
May 15, 2018 at 2:22 pmHi there! our bookshelves are in the living room that’s why they are not shown here. We don’t have a huge collection of books because it’s a temporary place that we are living in right now. We get most of our books from the local library.