If you are doing a unit on penguins which could be perfect during the winter months, try out this cute literacy center on penguins. It is super simple to create and the kids would have a blast learning letters/words through this game.
All you need is a cardboard box and some colored prints of a penguin and fish. Stick the penguin on the box and make a slit around its mouth. Write letters on the fish and ask children to feed the letter fish to the penguin. They should be able to say the name and sound of each letter. Encourage them to cross out the letters on the recording sheet.
They can do this activity independently or with you if you are trying to assess their letter knowledge.
Do you have kids who wriggle and wiggle and good ol' listening doesn't really help them to learn anything?
Well, then this fun game will get them excited, moving and learning. All you need is few tumblers/cans/baskets, letter cutouts and a ball/beanbag.
Attach the letters on the tumblers. I stuck the letters on clothespins and attached them on cans. The kids had to throw the ball in a can, name the letter and give a word beginning with the letter.
It was a fast paced game which made the kids and the teacher happy. Kids, because they didn't have to be just passive learners and the teacher, because she could do a quick assessment of who knew what in a super fun way.
After this game, I put the letters in a pocket chart and gave pictures of words beginning with those letters to the kids. They had to listen to the sound in the word and place the picture under the correct letter.
Its so much fun teaching young children the alphabet, firstly because there are so many possibilities to teach it and also because letter knowledge is the starting point to get children excited about reading. In this post i have collated different activities catering to different learning styles to teach the alphabet. Its common knowledge that children learn differently and hence I love incorporating multiple intelligence's while planning letter activities.
The activities below include crafts, songs, books and other fun stuff that you can use in the classroom or even as a parent at home.
For letter a, use an apple to make apple imprints.
For letter b, blow up balloons and ask your child to give a word from the letter. If he/she gives a correct word let him/her burst the balloon. Make it fun by counting how many balloons your child was able to burst.
For letter c, let your kinesthetic learners feel cotton and stick it on a template of letter c.
To get your musical bunch moving to the beats of a song, sing "Elephants have wrinkles" for letter e.
Make hand puppets to go with the song.
To cater to the demands of your linguistic learners, read the book "Fish Faces" by Norbert Wu for letter f. Ask children to make funny fish pouts and let them decorate a fish template.
For letter g, let the kids color with green/grey color and sprinkle some glitter on the letter.
For letter h, give different shapes to the kids to help them turn the template of letter h into a house.
Children will freak out when you tell them that they will paint an igloo with an ice cube, for letter i. Don't forget to capture their expressions when they are painting!
Get your logical thinkers to put on their thinking caps for this activity. Place different kinds/sizes of jars for children to sort according to size. Mix the lids and let them find and fit it on the correct jars.
For letter k, fly kites if possible or decorate a simple kite pattern.
Let the kids have fun licking lollipops for letter l.
Sing the five little monster song for letter m. Make puppets and let children enact the song.
Do some dancing on newspapers for letter n. Spread the newspaper and play some music. The child should not step out of the newspaper. Keep folding the newspaper and see how far your child can go.
Let your child solve an octopus puzzle for letter o. Let him/her put all the tentacles with short o words on the octopus. Download the puzzle by clicking on the pictures.
For letter p, make pig puppets. Let children use them to narrate the story of three little pigs.
Use q-tips or ear buds to do some painting on letter q.
Make rabbit head bands for letter r and take your kids out for a rabbit race.
Do some straw painting for letter s.
Have a toy party for letter t. Ask children to bring their favorite toys to share.
Do an upside down, under the table coloring for letter u. Kids will have a blast with this activity. It adds novelty to any coloring activity.
Make volcanoes for letter v. I do a demo first with my kids and let them make play dough volcanoes. I send a note home explaining how the lava can be made. Download the note by clicking on the picture.
"The Snail and the Whale" by Julia Donaldson is an excellent book on whales. Read it while doing letter w and let children use their imagination to draw whales.
For letter x, bring out old x-rays and let children pretend to be doctors. Put out white paint for them to make x- ray of their hands.
Stick yarn on letter y.
Take your naturalist learners on a trip to the zoo. Let them record what they saw at the zoo on the sheet below.
Have fun doing all these activities with your little ones!
Sometimes an idea gets stuck in your mind and you are forced to leave everything and work solely on that idea till it takes shape. So the creative bug bit me last night while i was on pinterest and couldn't sleep because tons of ideas were playing in my head while i was going on pinning.
I had to force my self to shut pinterest down, but sleep was no where near. So I decided to get up and work on my sound muncher project which was completely not in my agenda of things. Even though i had got my fair share of inspiration from pinterest i really didn't know where to start.
That came from Pinterest too :)
So i got myself ready and voila in one hour flat i completed my Monster themed letter pack.
My previous sound muncher had to be revamped. He is sitting happily next to my brain break basket in this picture !
I didn't have any time in the beginning of school year to make him look fancy, but hey summer breaks for teachers are meant to complete all incomplete projects. :)
So I decided to turn the regular muncher into a monster muncher since my kiddos were super excited about the monster theme during the manners unit. And i think he turned out cute.
I also made a letter monster wand.
Children will use him to find and say the sounds of letters.
After they will feed the muncher with words beginning with a particular letter, i will let them draw all the objects they fed him. Feeding the muncher will be a large group activity and drawing on the paper will be an individual activity. Drawing will help to consolidate the whole group activity as children will learn to focus and observe the words being fed to the muncher.
I will also place my muncher in the center and let children feed him magnetic letters. After feeding him they will circle the letters which they fed the muncher in the sheet below.
In the pack, i have also included uppercase and lowercase monster letter cards which children can match and then feed the muncher.
There are some more cards which i will laminate and put in a binder ring so children can draw various objects beginning with each letter.
And a fun poster which i will hang next to my monster muncher
Hope you liked all these fun activities. If you would like to download them click on the link below:
I am so happy at the moment that i can dance without music. I am off to the place which makes me super ecstatic and at peace. I like to believe that my stay in Singapore for over 5 years made me the person i am today. They were the most enjoyed moments of my life so far and the fact that i will be missing two school days, just expresses my desire to be there. When people ask me what is it that attracts me to the city, i always fail to draw up a list. Because i will never be able to put in words what i experienced there. I can just say that they were the picture perfect moments of my life !
This is how i feel at times when i reminisce about my old days but i also strongly believe that life is too short for regrets. I am like a bird of passage and the discovery and exploration of new places gives meaning to my life. But Singapore will always hold a special place in my heart because it was my first baby step to the many more steps that i would be taking in my life :) And i am grateful to God for letting me experience the good Ol' days once again.
And because i am so excited i am putting up my alphabet word wall pack on TPT for free till Tuesday.
It has alphabet cards and pictures of words beginning with each letter. The cards can be used for games, center activities and of course on the word wall.
Its that time of the school year where my little angels have started to read . They have understood the concept of blending sounds and are making an attempt to read simple sentences using their phonetic and sight word knowledge. As a teacher it is such an incredible feeling to see children read and make sense of what they are reading. To elevate children's interest in reading, i have been doing a lot of fun activities in small groups with them. The most favorite activity is with magnetic letters. Children select a picture and then make words.
I have also made CVC word family tins for them. They use a strip with the word family written on it and place individual letters to read words.
I also found interesting word family strips from blog.maketaketeach.com
I use a context while reading CVC Words in a large group. I tell children that all the letters are playing on a slide and some are scared to go down alone. So they need to take the help of another letter friend. For instance if it is word family 'it' that we are focusing on, the letter 'i' would need help. So his friend 't' would hold his hand and they would go down the slide together. I prompt children to take out the "it" sound. These letters wait at the bottom of the slide to catch other letter friends. Children instantly say 'kit' when letter 'k' comes down the slide.
It is a super fun way to teach them blending. Even the ones who need help while blending are able to read with this strategy.
After we finish reading on the flannel board, we sing a song to reinforce all the words .
The lyrics are as follows:
The letters /i/ /t/, they always says /it/
just like in the words 'kit' and 'sit'
and 'hit' and 'pit'
and 'lit' and 'bit'
k says/k/, put /k/ before /it/
/kit/ always says kit
s says/s/ put /s/ before /it/
/sit/ always says sit
h says/h/ put /h/ before /it/
/hit/ always says hit
p says/p/ put /p/ before /it/
/pit/ always says pit
l says/l/ put /l/ before /it/
/lit/ always says lit
b says/b/ put /b/ before /it/
/bit/ always says bit
The letters /i/ /t/, they always says /it/
just like in the words 'kit' and 'sit'
and 'hit' and 'pit'
and 'lit' and 'bit'
I have also created a CVC Word pack for my little kiddos
I am using the sheets from my pack to send for home practice. If you would like to purchase it, you can download it from my TPT Store.
The school year is about to end in India and i want to gear up for the next session. We start the year with introducing alphabets to our little kids and end by reading simple sentences, so i am working on an alphabet pack which would soon be available on my TPT store. I would like to end the post with some free downloadable sheets for CVC words.
I worked on some writing sheets for my little kiddos. They are super simple and doesn't burden the kids with the pressure of writing. It has both uppercase and lowercase tracing and space to practice independent writing. This could be used by teachers in a small group or could be sent for home practice. Parents can also download them from my TPT store for additional practice.At the moment, i am only posting the worksheets for letters a-e. I will post the rest soon.
You could click on the link below to download them for free. Alphabet Worksheets
