Today we’re joined by Kristina from Toddler Approved, who’s sharing a fun paper plate name game that helps children learn to recognise, read and spell their name.
the A-Z of how to write
I’m joining in the global A-Z blog party today with an alphabet dedicated to learning how to write. Here are twenty-six fun, creative, tried-and-tested ideas that you can use with your children to help them enjoy their first steps in learning how to write. There are ideas here for sensory alphabets, making spellings fun, encouraging creative storytelling and bringing writing into your everyday imaginary play.
A-Z of learning how to write [Read more…]
Literacy games: bingo
>>> Download our guide to ABCs and 123s here
Here’s how to make your own bingo game to help your child practise their letters.
1. Make several grids on paper or card. You can draw them by hand or print them from the computer. You need at least one grid per player but if you make more you’ll be able to swap cards and play the game several times. You can make the grid any size you like but 6 squares are a good start for pre-schoolers.
2. Add a letter into each square.
3. Make a set of square cards with a letter on each, corresponding to the letters on your grids.
4. Give every player a grid and then turn the square cards face down.
5.Take it in turns to pick a square card. When you turn over a square, see if you can make the right sound for the letter.
6. If the letter you picked is on your grid you can keep it to cover up the letter on your grid. If you don’t have the letter on your grid, place it back face-down.
7. The winner is the first person to cover all the letters on their card and gets to shout ‘bingo!’.
You can of course make different versions of this game to work on numbers, colours and words.
My guide to ABCs and 123s
Do you have a young child who is learning their ABCs and 123s, and do you want to make their learning fun? Our ABCs and 123s resource of mulitsensory, play-based letter and math activities is just what you need. See more here.
Make an alphabet chart
While we were making our first autumn craft of the year on Monday we also added to the sensory alphabet we’re working on. Once she’d satisfied her need to do some sticking, L made some leaf rubbings using wax crayons. We cut them out and used them as the background for our ‘l is for leaf’ picture.
>>> Download our guide to ABCs and 123s here
Crafting with children is such a good way to help them develop important skills: picking out all the autumn colours from the crayon pot works on classification skills, important for maths and literacy, and using scissors to cut out leaves works on fine motor skills.
We also made a ‘h is for hole’ a while ago – turns out a hole-punch is fascinating when you’re 4! Here’s how out alphabet is coming along.
My guide to ABCs and 123s
Do you have a young child who is learning their ABCs and 123s, and do you want to make their learning fun? Our ABCs and 123s resource of mulitsensory, play-based letter and math activities is just what you need. See more here.
Alphabet games
Alphabet games
L is getting more and more interested in letters and we’re using our magnetic alphabet set to play some alphabet games. There are lots of ways you can use letters of course, depending on how old your children are, but here are two easy games to use with those just starting to recognise letters.
I spy my name
Put a selection of letters on the fridge door (making sure they are all the right way up) and ask your child if they can hunt out the ones which are in their name. We’ve been writing L’s name on drawings, coat pegs, cards to send to friends and so on ever since she was tiny so she’s had lots of chance to get to know what her name looks like. I sound out the letters of her name as I write them and she has learned the sounds, order and shape of them pretty much just by observing this. A child’s name is a great place to start working with letters: they’re pretty ego-centric so they like it being all about them! We always use a capital first letter and lowercase for all the others (so I replicate this with the fridge magnets too).
Letter snap
We put all the letters on the fridge and I select one and say ‘this is an ‘a” and ask L if she can make a match. Snap! She likes to take a turn choosing a letter for me to match – which lets me see how many letters she knows the sound for.
Have you got a set of magnetic letters on your fridge door? How do you play with yours?
C is for caterpillar
I love child-led learning. When I’m helping a child learn a new skill I try to put them and their interests at the centre of any activity. Little is starting to be very interested in letters and writing and I’m always looking for ways to encourage her to explore these ideas. So when she discovered this beautiful green caterpillar in the garden we used it as a springboard to play.
She was wondering where the caterpillar’s head was and we were talking about the spiral shape it had made as it curled up. We grabbed some outdoor chalks and tried to copy the shape ourselves. It’s great for children to try making all sorts of marks – not just using paper and pencil, and not straightaway trying to write letters.
Then we talked about the word caterpillar and what sound came at the beginning – which lead us on to writing a ‘c’.
And also inspired the next letter for our touchy-feely alphabet: c is for caterpillar.
This week why not get some chalks and see what shapes you can make?
