{"id":1054,"date":"2025-05-26T23:19:24","date_gmt":"2025-05-26T23:19:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newdadsewingschool.com\/wordpress\/?p=1054"},"modified":"2026-06-06T23:43:06","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T23:43:06","slug":"make-a-diy-kids-card-holder-to-teach-days-of-the-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newdadsewingschool.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2025\/05\/26\/make-a-diy-kids-card-holder-to-teach-days-of-the-week\/","title":{"rendered":"Make a DIY Kids Card Holder to Teach Days of the Week"},"content":{"rendered":"

Get started on early development yourself by teaching scheduling and days of the week using your own homemade materials.<\/p>\n

My toddler daughter goes to daycare during the week and often visits her grandmother on the weekend. She understands \u201ctoday\u201d and \u201ctomorrow\u201d. But she still doesn\u2019t understand days of the week or calendar events yet. She knows the days of the week but it\u2019s hard to convey \u201cwe will go to school in two days\u201d or “we will visit Grandma on Saturday”. I also want to have something that she can look at herself and know if today she will go to school or stay home. So I decided to sew my own visual days of the week calendar that she can use to track events. I also wanted to sew it myself and save money over subscription childhood development products.<\/p>\n

Focus on Early Childhood Development<\/strong><\/h2>\n

My wife and I also put a strong emphasis on early development for my daughter. We try to give her as many opportunities to do things on her own as possible, like letting her help out with dinner preparation and setting the table. We also try to give her a sense of autonomy and control in her life. And a big part of fostering that independence is helping her know what happens when and in what order. And a big part of that is timing and scheduling. We try to bridge the gap in her understanding through pictures and posters.<\/p>\n

The Cost Dilemma<\/strong><\/h2>\n

After my daughter was born we subscribed to early childhood development learning boxes with a variety of different activities for her. These were nice, but she would be interested in maybe half of the items. It was also really expensive. So I eventually opted to design and make my own childhood development materials myself, and save money. These projects may seem difficult on the surface other to make yourself, but they are actually pretty straightforward.<\/p>\n

The Design of the Kids Card Holder<\/strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n

I thought of the best way to represent the days of the week to help my daughter remember the days of the week and thought that an image glyph style labeling would help. I\u2019ve always liked the Japanese naming of days of the week \u6708\u706b\u6c34\u6728\u91d1\u571f\u65e5 (Moon Monday, Fire Tuesday, Water Wednesday, Wood Thursday, Gold Friday, Earth Saturday and Sun Sunday). <\/p>\n

From a learning perspective I want to try to try and help make these phoenetically similar to English like Moonday, two fires for Tuesday, wet for Wednesday and  (logically) sun for Sunday. Even if it doesn\u2019t line up I like the idea of glyphs for keeping track of days and events.<\/p>\n

DIY to Make it More Sturdy and Reusable<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The process here is to prepare the backing, then sew three vinyl pockets. Finally, I will line them up on the backing, sew down and seal up the edges with folded bias.<\/p>\n

This way the board can be repurposed for different activities like a list of glyphs for daily chores or pictures for her daily routine (like a getting ready for school checklist) if I want to use it for something else.<\/p>\n

I would recommend printing these out onto a firm card stock so they\u2019re more kid-resilient and easier to move around.<\/p>\n

If you don\u2019t want to draw these out yourself you can get the bonus printable for the days of the week and events here<\/a>: (I sell the printables because it helps keep this site running).<\/p>\n

To Sew the Kids Card Holder you Will Need<\/strong><\/h2>\n