Beading Letters

I like to get each of the kids at least one "educational" toy or book each Christmas. My 2010 reading goal for Mia is to have her sounding out simple three letter words by the time she turns five. For her for Christmas, I chose a Melissa and Doug Deluxe Wooden Stringing Beads set. It comes with over 200 beads, and shoelaces to string them on. She was eager to spell family names (with careful help). Then she wanted to spell "Mat sat on a rat." It was her idea. I wonder how she came up with something basic and phonetic out of the blue. I talked about spacing between words, and encouraged her to use the flowers to separate the words.

Matching Upper to Lower Case

Mia and Little Nephi are learning to recognize and name their letters. After that, we'll work on letter sounds.

We purchased Melissa and Doug's Magnet Wooden Alphabet. The set includes upper case and lower case letters. I cut cardstock in half, the

n traced each of the letters with a pencil (pictured below is the only set I attempted with pen).

The first time the children saw them, they just had to have every card laid out at the same time. It was a lot of work for them. After that, I decided to only get out one card at a time, with just the letters that go with that card (mixed up). Miriam quickly lost interest in this alphabet activity, but Little Nephi has been requesting it several times a week for a month or more. I try to stay nearby so I can name the letters when he picks them up. Now I will give him up to three cards at once. He can name almost every letter of the alphabet (although a few he pronounces incorrectly).