TEACHING THE ALPHABET - Letter Collages

I have been teaching preschool for nearly 20 years.  One of my primary goals for my little ones is to help them learn the alphabet.  We focus on a letter a week, but we do not go in order.  I try to correlate the alphabet letter with the theme we have for the week. This has given the letter a context, more relevance,  and a takes more of a whole language approach to make it meaningful.  Each week has it's own theme based activities, but I do have some things that I do consistently with each letter to reinforce our learning of the alphabet.  This will be the first in a series of posts about TEACHING THE ALPHABET.

LETTER COLLAGES

A great introduction to the alphabet letters is to give students a tactile experience.  I use this as an arrival activity as we begin each week.  We use a half sheet of paper that has an outline of both the upper and lower case letter.  We fill the letter with items that begin with the letter by gluing, stamping, texture rubbing, etc.  I have a large assortment of SHAPE PUNCHES that are quick and cheap (most cost only a dollar from the dollar corner at Target, the party supply section at Walmart, or the dollar store.)  I also have an assortment of rubber stamps - including alphabet sets (find them cheaply on ebay) that I use - especially for those hard letters like X.  Occasionally, I have used stickers, or  printed small pictures (finding images in clipart libraries) to be glued on.

This activity is worthwhile on so many levels.

• First - I have found that it is a great sensory/tactile experience to literally help the students feel the shape of the letter. 
• Second - it is an outstanding small motor activity to encourage a range of fine motor skills and improve finger dexterity. For many kids it is a challenge just to use a glue stick or to pick up a small piece with those little finger muscles.
• Third - I have used it to practice sorting and patterning skills.  When I make punches, I will make at least two colors.  Then I can instruct the students to put one color on the upper case letter, and the other color on the lower case.  They can also use the shapes to make a pattern.

I realize most things just get thrown away when they come home from school, but I have know multiple families who have collected these into a book, or hung them around their children's bedrooms.

A - apples (punch shape/stamp), apple seeds, plastic ants (available at party supply stores or Amazon)
B - black beans, buttons, bumble bee (stamp), butterfly (punch shape/stamp)
C - cotton balls, Cheerios, cat (punch shape/stamp), candy cane (punch shape/stamp/sticker)
D - dots (colored stickers), dinosaur (punch shape, stickers or stamps), dime rubbings
E - egg shells, egg (punch shape), eyes (googly eyes from the craft store)
F - flowers (punch shape, stamp or stickers), fingerprints
G - glitter (gold or green)
H - hearts  (punch shape, stamp or stickers)
I - ice cream cones  (stamp, stickers or clipart prints)
J - jewels (plastic rhinestone jewels from craft stores or jewel nail stickers often found in party sections)
K - keys (rubbings or clipart prints)
L - lace, leafs (punch shape/stamp)
M - macaroni
N - noodles, nickel rubbings, newspaper scraps
O - octopus  (punch shape/stamp/stickers), o shaped stickers (hole reinforcement stickers)
P - popcorn
Q - q-tips
R - red ribbon
S - stars  (punch shape/stamp/stickers)
T - toothpicks, turkeys  (punch shape/stamp/stickers)
U - umbrellas  (punch shape, stamp or stickers)
V - velvet ribbon, velcro
W - watermelon  (punch shape/stamp/stickers)
X - x-ray (stamp), or letter x stamp
Y - yellow yarn
Z - zipper rubbing

Color Book - BLUE

Haven't updated the blog for a while.  Here is another post about colors.  I usually do colors over an extended period of time, having one day with a color focus each week.  So, it takes a couple of months to get through all the colors.  I typically do this during the fall, because several colors work so well with fall themes.

BLUE - Blue Bubble Paint

I like to do this activity in conjunction with our study of the letter "B" - lots of b-b-b sounds in "blue bubbles".

To make the blue bubble paint, mix ¼ cup blue tempera or 2 tablespoons liquid water color paint (or you could use blue tempera paint too) with 2 tablespoons of liquid dish soap and ½ cup water in a medium sized disposable container (like a cool whip carton). Stir gently to combine. Cover table with plenty of newspaper -- this will be messy.  Give each child their own drinking straw and have them take turns blowing bubbles in the bubble paint. When the bubbles erupt above the rim of the bowl, gently touch the paper to the blue bubbles. Repeat until the entire paper is covered with blue bubble prints.

Alphabet Clip Art Set 2

This took a lot longer than I originally thought it would, but I finally got it finished and added to the TpT site today.  Hope it will be useful.  It is also available in black and white and in a bundle with the first alphabet pack.

Alphabet Clipart

Just a quick preview of the new alphabet clip art I created.  I am working on the color version and have a second second set in the works as well.  Since I noticed that this is the 20th item I have added to the TpT store, I thought it would be a great time to have a little sale.  So, everything in my store is 20% off from October 28 - October 31.  Enjoy the treat!

Color Book: YELLOW

YELLOW - Autumn Leaves

Yellow is a great color of autumn.  For our unit today, each child is asked to bring a leaf (not necessarily a yellow one).

First we sort the leafs by color.

Then we read a book about leafs.  There are lots of great ones.  I like to read a non-fiction book and a fiction book.

Then we do leaf rubbings.  I usually let them do two.  One they can use different colors, and then one with just yellow rubbings which is saved for the color book.

Another fun activity inspired by pinterest, was making these great marbleized autumn leafs.  This was a lot of fun, and the results were beautiful.

First, fill a cake pan with shaving cream.

 Then, drizzle paints over the cream.

Use a pencil and drag it back and forth through the paint to create a design like this:

Press a leaf cutout into the paint.

Use a squeegee to scrape off the shaving cream.

The results were great swirls of autumn colors!

Color Book: RED

RED –  Apples

For our apple unit, we begin by reading two great books:

Apple Farmer Annie by Monica Wellington (A great story about all the different things you can do with apples.  She harvests them, sorts them, makes pies, and juice and apple sauce, and then sells the apples and apple products at market)

The Apple Pie Tree by Zoe Hall  (this story follows the growth of apples from blossom to fruit)

I encourage each child to bring an apple from home.  I always have a few extras on hand for those who forget.  We start by counting them and sorting them (color, size, stem/no stem, sticker/no sticker, etc.). 

Then we use the apples to make apple sauce and apple prints. 

Making Apple Prints: (Of course save these for the color book)

Be sure to use at least two apples and cut one horizontally and the other one vertically.  You’ll be able to create two different types of prints.  To aid the students in grasping the slippery apples , I use a potato peeler to make two small holes to use as “handles”.  If you just squirt a small amount of paint onto a paper plate and rub the apple around, this seems to produce good prints.  Another alternative is to use a foam brush and paint the apple halves before making a print.

Making Apple Sauce:

I use my handy dandy "Apple Peeler, Corer, Slicer" machine to whip right through the prep process.  The kids LOVE using this machine.

We put all the apples in a pot and add the other ingredients (a little water, a little sugar, and a dash of cinnamon. The variety of apples make the finished product tastier!

While the kids are helping we sing:

Making Applesauce Song (to the tune of Skip to My Lou)
Take some apples, put them in a pot
Stir them, stir them, stir them a lot
Add cinnamon and sugar, and what have we got
We made some apple sauce.

Applesauce Recipe
6 apples (peeled, cored and chopped )
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
sprinkle of cinnamon

Place all ingredients in covered saucepan. Bring to a quick boil.  Reduce heat and simmer for 15-20 minutes, or until apples are tender. Pour contents into a blender and blend until desired consistency (I like it with some chunks.) 

I personally do not love apple sauce that you buy at the store, but I LOVE homemade apple sauce - especially warm.

Another great apple books is:

Ten Red Apples by Pat Hutchings (a great counting book)

Please note:  I have made a great updated version of the color book and added it to my TpT store.  You can find it here:  COLOR BOOK

Color Book - Cover (Rainbows)

Fall is the perfect time to learn about color and explore art with many different mediums.  With younger learners, art is more about the process of creation.  This unit provides an opportunity to try many different processes and mediums including:  water color painting, print making, rubbings, bubble painting, cutting, directed drawing, stamping, finger painting (blending colors), folding,  stenciling, and sewing.

You can begin with the cover to introduce the unit, but I have ended with the cover as a concluding activity, and that works well too.

We read the book A Rainbow of My Own by Don Freeman and then use a prism and a flashlight to create a rainbow in the classroom. 

Some other great color books to have on hand are


White Rabbit's Color Book by Alan Baker

Pete the Cat:  I Love My White Shoes by James Dean & Eric Litwin

Brown Bear by Bill Martin Jr and Eric Carle

To complete the cover we use water color paints to make a rainbow.  Since this is a first experience for many students, I carefully demonstrate how to dip your paintbrush in water and swirl it around in the paint working across the paint palate in rainbow order, and of course thoroughly rinsing between each color so the paints don't mix.   Two small dots are on the cover page to assist the children in making the first arch of the rainbow.  If they start at one dot, and make a large red arch and finish it at the other dot, there should be enough room for all the colors.  This is a great opportunity to teach the sequence of the colors of the rainbow.  I also encourage the kids to paint at least one letter on the color page with each color before they rinse their brush so the title is a rainbow too.