Photo by Karen Horton

Make learning the alphabet fun with this clever idea by Mary, a Pre-K Teacher, in Boston, MA.

Young children learn best when they’re encouraged to move throughout the day. A game my students thoroughly enjoy is Musical Letters, a variation of the classic game, Musical Chairs.  I place large alphabet letters in a circle on the floor, adding a few more than the number of children playing. This gives each child the opportunity to play a few rounds of the game. To begin, each child stands on a letter. When the music begins the children walk around the circle, stepping on the letters as they go. When the music stops, each child hurries to stand on a letter. At first there will be an extra letter or two so everyone gets a letter to stand on. As I pick up one of the extra letters from the floor the children say, “Good bye (name of letter)!” I then ask each child to identify the letter she/he is standing on. The music begins again. Soon there are more children than letters. A child unable to find a letter to stand on is “out” and gets to identify the next letter to be removed from the circle. At the end of each round, I ask the remaining children to name their letters. The game continues until only one child is left standing on a letter. Hint: As the year progresses we incorporate lower case letters and numbers into the play. You can also use this game to review blends, clusters, word families, etc.

This article was originally published in the August 2011 Classroom Connection newsletter.  Read more great teacher tips and ideas from that edition below:

Map Out a Theme

Take Your Class Library to the Next Level

August’s Story of the Month

3 Ways to Acknowledge & Appreciate Families

Classroom Library Offers an Earful of Learning

Hit SEND to Receive Lots of Terrific Reads

Wet Their Whistles

An Engaging Way to Direct Traffic

A Show of Hands Yields Great Results

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Energize Alphabet Time with Musical Letters Game

Star Pupils Take Mini Steps to Success