Letter recognition – it is one of the most important foundations of learning. Without knowing letters, children will have trouble learning phonics and how to read. For some children, learning their letters comes easily, but for others, it can be quite a struggle. Try some of the fun lessons below to help your preschool or kindergarten class master their ABCs.
Learning the Alphabet
Shaving Cream
There is something that is so much fun about tracing letters in a pile of shaving cream. Students love the feel of the fluffy foam between their fingers as they practice writing the letter of the day. Inexpensive and effective, shaving cream is a great material to use when your students need a hands on activity. A bonus to the fun is that your desks and table tops will be exceptionally clean and your classroom will smell nice and fresh.
Letter Hunt
Break out the old magazines and send your students on a letter hunt through the pages. Ask them to find five to 10 examples of the letter you are working on. The pictures can be of the actual letter itself or they can be of things that begin with that letter’s sound. Have students glue the pictures to a piece of paper and save them in a folder. When all of the letters have been completed, staple each child’s pages together to form a book.
Cookie Cutter Letters
Manipulatives are essential in preschool and kindergarten. Cookie cutters are a great option for teaching letters. You can either make real cookies that your students can decorate with icing or sprinkles and eat (at home!), or you can use play dough in a learning center along with the alphabet cutters.
Alphabet Toss
Helping students connect letters to sounds is a monumental task. With an alphabet toss game you can encourage students to think of as many words as they can that begin with each letter. Use an alphabet beanbag and have students toss it lightly one to another. When each child catches it, he must say the letter, the sound it makes and a word that begins with it. When the beanbag makes its way back to you, switch it for a different letter and repeat the process. Continue with as many letters as you would like to include.
Air Writing
The best thing about this activity is that it takes nothing more than a child’s pointer finger and some imagination. Tell students that today you are all going to be sky writers. Your index finger is your airplane and you are going to practice writing each letter of the alphabet in the sky. While there will be no concrete way to measure students’ success in forming each letter, you can watch them and get a good idea of who is struggling with their letters.
There are a lot of ways to reinforce letter learning. What are some of your favorite ways to teach students the alphabet? Leave a comment below and share your ideas!
Penny says
Love using shaving cream but have found that the shaving cream with aloe is really sticky and doesn’t disappear easily.
Cara Fitton says
Sponge paint with letter sponges, dot markers filling the letter outline, Scholastic alphabet book set, short repetitve stories & poems.
Reagan B says
Students are familiar with the places that they go often (certain stores, restaurants, etc.). When you are working on a letter that a popular chain starts with, bring in some products with their logo on it so that students will associate the letter and sound with something they know!
Trish says
After making cards with an upper or lower case letters on both sides, you will need 4 or 5 of each letter, I tell the children a motion that they will do when they see the letter. I shuffle the cards for 2 different letters and as i show each, the children say the name or the sound and do the motion I associated with the letter. ” If you see a “b” or a “B”, bounce. I you see a “c” or a “C”, clap” Then I show the letters with out saying anything. The children take over and have a blast. The movement doesnt have to begin with the letter sound…. but it helps. This is a brain smart way to review the letters and their sounds.