Letter Fun

Over the past few months, we've continued our preschool-type learning time here at home. I love how the "letter of the week" framework gives me new ideas for experiences I never would've thought of doing otherwise. The boys are learning some good skills and seem to be enjoying themselves in the process.

We're slowly working on our tactile letter book pages. For the letter M, we covered our page in macaroni.

Then, we experimented with magnets. Cody and Jaden guessed whether or not various items would be magnetic (this was a tough word to learn to say!), and then we'd test out the objects. The boys wanted to play with the magnets for a long time.

Later, we built structures out of marshmallows and toothpicks. This fine-motor skill was a bit challenging, so it didn't keep their interest for long. Eating the marshmallows was fun, though! :)

Another day, we made monsters out of paint by doing straw-blown pictures. Afterward, I realized that I should have watered down the paint a bit to make it spread better. The boys still were proud of their final products. 

Then, we played this monster dice game which is pretty self-explanatory when you look at the picture...

After that, we made color patterns with M&Ms. Cody and Jaden did surprisingly well with not eating the candy until we were done with our activity. They found the patterns fairly easy to complete.

I wasn't sure whether or not this next activity would hold the boys' interest for long at all, but they just loved it! After counting the number of monsters on each card, the boys had to cover up the correct number with a clothespin.

Cody and Jaden wanted to complete the entire set of 12 cards at least three times in a row, and then we repeated the activity several more times later that day. This game has now become a perfect addition to our church activity bag!

Next up, M is for Music! I didn't get many great pictures of this next activity, but our whole family got in on it. I played samples of various genres of music on the computer, and we danced together. Cody and Jaden most enjoyed dancing to techno and swing. We also danced to some country, classical, Christian contemporary, R&B, rock, and jazz. Some of these genres were completely new to Jaden and Cody, so it was fun to see their reactions to each. Their dancing was fairly consistent no matter what type of music was on. :)

For our letter H week, we covered our tactile book page with hearts...

...and then used heart pages to count by 10. I don't think I had ever practiced this skill with the boys before, so it was a great learning experience.

The boys' favorite H activity was doing a house hunt. They ran around our home counting various items. Both boys were so focused on this task and determined to not forget a single item!

Another day, we made little guys with crazy hair and then gave them a haircut. We're still working on the scissors skill, so this activity gave them a fun reason to practice.

For letter L, we covered a leaf with numbered dot stickers, or "ladybugs." They matched the numbers from 1 to 20.

Cody and Jaden concentrated very hard on this activity, can you tell? :)

 

Then, we went on a leaf hunt outdoors to collect items for our letter book page.

We also did Lego stamping (We actually used Duplo blocks, but calling them Legos made the activity fit well with our letter L week!). Since we had just finished Valentine's Day, I had the boys do their Lego stamping on hearts that we made into thank you notes.

Jaden's heart was an abstract design.

Cody kept his nice and neat :) These boys are sure teaching me not to peg them into certain roles!

We didn't do too much with the letter K, but the boys liked doing key stamping.

And that's our latest with letters!