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Lower Case Milk Cap Letters (& Intro to Alphabetical Order)

Sweet Pea is 5 years old.

From: Ever since I posted a worksheet with my original upper case milk cap letters, people have been emailing me asking for a set of lower case letters too.   I finally created a set of them and thought up this quick activity for introducing alphabetical order to go along with it.

Material:

Procedure:

  • Lay the long strip of 26 circles on the floor and place the sheet with the printed alphabet on it nearby.
  • Spread the milk cap letters out near the strip of 26 circles.
  • Ask your tot what the first letter of the alphabet is.  When he says, “A”, ask him to find the “A” milk cap letter and place it in the first circle.
  • Continue asking him which letter comes next and invite him to find and place that letter on the appropriate circle.
  • If he has difficulty remembering the next letter, suggest that he refer to the printed alphabet≥
 
  •  Let your tot continue working until all of the circles are filled with the correct letters.

Observations:  Sweet Pea didn’t love this quite as much as she does most of our art activities, but she was interested and worked on it until she had placed all of the letters in the correct spots.

Sweet Pea was worried that there weren’t going to be enough circles to hold every letter.  She insisted on checking to make sure there was a spot for each letter before we got started.

As it is, I would only recommend this for tots who are already very familiar with the alphabet (older preschool or kindergarten).  If it is a bit too difficult for your tot, then you could write in letters on the strip of circles and just let your tot match the milk cap letters to them.

Notes from the Trenches:   Make sure you have a printed alphabet available for your tot to use to check his work.  You may be surprised at the difficulty your child has with this activity.  Despite the fact that Sweet Pea can sing the alphabet song and knows the sounds of all of the letters, she had to refer to the printed alphabet several times.

Even with the printed alphabet, she got a bit confused about where to put the “S”.

However, getting the tape out of the dispenser may have been the most difficult part of the activity for Sweet Pea.  🙂  I think I could set up an activity with a tape dispenser just to work on fine motor control.

Creating the milk cap letters takes a bit of time, but I think it is worth it because of the increased durability and the fact that the milk caps have an interesting “feel” that draws a child’s interest.  I decoupaged the letters while I was watching TV and it only took me about an hour.

Rating: 2 Stars * (Independent, Frugal)

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