Tuesday, April 27, 2010

ABC activities for pre-schoolers

For the past couple of months, I have been doing some ABC activities with my boys. I thought I'd post each one separately, but time is short these days, so you get one big ABC post for now. I love all things ABC. So I'm sure I'll have more ABC posts in the future.

Here are a few things we have done. (at the end of the post will be a few websites/blogs where I have found some of these ideas.)

We started doing one letter a day, reading a story that had to do with the letter, doing a little coloring/tracing page, a poem or song on some days, and a craft making something from the letter.


M is for MONSTER
{pipe cleaners, google eyes, construction paper, markers}

R is for ROAD
{construction paper, glue stick, transportation stickers}

T is for Telephone
{yarn, tape, dot stickers, marker, crayons}

S is for Silly Sticker Snake
{construction paper, stickers, google eyes, crayons}


Since I was a teacher for many years, I have a lot of books. I recently pulled out my ABC books. Here are a few of my favorites. There are so many good ABC books out there!

ABC egg matching
I saw this on a few blogs around Easter. What a cute idea! You write a lower case letter on one half of the egg, and an uppercase letter on the other half. The kids match the letters up. You could also hide them all over the house, have them find them and then match them up.  There is a lot you can do with these little plastic eggs.

ABC flash cards
You can find the cutest little flash cards at the dollar store! I picked up a few sets a while ago. I just gave my 4 1/2 year old a set and let him do with it whatever he wanted. He started reading the letters and putting them in order. Give your child a set of ABC flash cards and see what they do with them. :)

Leap Frog  Learning Toys/DVD's
I think just about everyone has a Word Whammer or a Letter Whammer from Leap Frog.
I love this toy. Did you know it does not spell naughty words? It spells 3-letter words, but if your child puts one that is -hummm..inappropriate- it won't spell it. Thank you Leap Frog.

We also picked up some DVD's from Costco a while ago- for 6.98 and they are the new favorites at our house. They go over and over the alphabet, and my kids just love them.
Hey- if they are going to be watching the T.V. at least it can be educational sometimes right?

There are lots of mommy blogs and websites that focus only on children's learning activities. Here are a few of my favorites:

Chasing Cheerios

No Time for Flashcards

The Crafty Crow

Filth Wizardry

Muffin Tin Mom

What are some of your favorite ABC activities or blogs/websites?

Thanks for reading!

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7 comments:

Jared and Delia said...

great ideas! I love the egg one the best.

The Wolfes said...

Love all of them but the Easter egg one wow genius!

Amy said...

The egg matching is so creative! I love it.

Alison Gibbs said...

Hi Sharla what fun ideas.

Young Family said...

I love Talking Word Factory.

***Sharon*** said...

Great ideas! I'm currently doing some similar things with my pre-preschooler. One of my favorite websites for ABC ideas is: ABC and 123 at http://abcand123learning.blogspot.com/

Looking forward to reading more!

Whitney & McKayla said...

I really like the egg idea too! My daughter's kindergarten teacher will probably enjoy it. Our kindergarten kiddos are actually "rented" the Talking Letter Factory DVD for the first few months of the year, it's well-loved at our house already.