I love when I see a great idea from other Moms in our community and when I saw this one, I HAD to share with everyone! My friend Lindsey has the cutest little girls, Ruby and Frances (follow their instagram!), who are always on adventures around town. She recently put up a picture of her “Letter of the Day” activity so I asked her to share how she does it. Read on to see how she does it and use the links to get some great, affordable materials from Amazon to help make this activity fun!
Magnetic Chalk Portable Easle // Letter Flash Cards // Alphabet Book // Letter Stickers // Felt Letter Board // Magnetic Letters
Last summer we would start by playing the Sesame Street “Letter of the Day” song (which, actually, its catchy and awesome). They are all on YouTube individually, so you can search for the letter and the songs ends with the “announcement” of the letter – which always made Ruby excited. Then we would just go through the various stacks of letter flashcards, fabric letters, and bathtub letters, blocks and magnets (it was amazing how many different sets of letter things I realized I already had in my house and most people probably do!). She would yell out “I found the letter D!” or whichever, then we’d compile them all and just talk about it throughout day, look for it on signs when we were out on walks or in the car. Before nap she would pick a book that had that letter on it, or I would try to pick one that “focused” on that letter.
This summer, I still use the little chalk easel (Target Dollar bin that I just put old scrapbooking stickers on top) but now that is what “announces” the letter of the day, as she is now over Elmo. Frannie (1.5) and I look through the stacks for the rest of the letters on display (but she can’t yet find them, she just “helps”) while Ruby searches around the house for objects that start with the letter of the day and brings them back to our shelf. Some days are easier than others- like B is easy to say & understand – plus a lot of quick easy objects start with B. C is harder for her because of the different sounds (she didn’t really understand Cinderella or Cheese starting with C because she was making the hard C sound for c-c-cat and c-c-cookie). So that’s the main component this year – working on the letter sounds, and what’s fun is we repeat it so many times “b-b-ball” that then so does Frannie, which is helping her learn more and more words and sounds.
Another thing we are trying to add it “writing” the letter that day, but that’s been a flop so far. We’ve tried with chalk, markers, or even the shaving cream way with your finger. She’s not quite ready for that, but it is still fun to try and she is more motivated to do so when it’s “the letter of the day”. It surprises me how much she gets into it – and even like enjoying c-c-carrots more than on any other day, if it’s the letter of the day. So honestly, you could even do it with no work at all other than just making a declaration at the beginning of the day (or week, as my mother-in-law does it) and then just look for that letter / talk about it all day. It’s even kept some tantrums at bay just with a quick distraction – “hey! I see the letter of the day on that girls shirt!”
And maybe this is all too much sounding, but it really is no effort, and I mean think of the work people do for silly Elf on the Shelf for 25 days! So this is just 1 more day than that 🙂