Sweet Pea is 35 months old.
From: Erika from Confessions of a Homeschooler often posts an individual Do-A-Dot letter worksheet when her tot is learning a particular letter (P for example), but I had trouble searching her site to find all of the letters. I also searched the web, but was surprised that I couldn’t find a full set of these anywhere so I decided I would just create my own. Since I made these however, I’ve learned that Erika sells her entire preschool alphabet curriculum (which contains way more than just Do-A-Dot worksheets) for $10.
Material:
- Do-A-Dot markers. (They are also called dotter or bingo markers. We found ours at Micheal’s.)
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(Click HERE for my entire Do-A-Dot upper case alphabet.)
- Smock or a Bib (optional, but highly recommended).
Procedure:
- Gather all your materials and sit next to your tot.
- Depending on your tot’s dexterity, you may need to unscrew the Dot-A-Dot markers for them.
- Show your tot how to press the marker straight down inside one of the circles on the worksheet to make a dot.
- Allow him or her to finish the rest of the worksheets on his or her own.
Observations: This activity was a huge hit. Sweet Pea absolutely loved dotting in the circles for each letter. She was easily able to unscrew the caps on her own, but some younger tots may need help.
At first it took some effort for her to get the marker lined up with each dot correctly, but she quickly improved.
Sweet Pea really deliberated about which color of marker to use for each letter. Â I had no idea it would matter to her so much, but she loved being able to choose from all the colors in the box and always used only one color for each letter.
Sweet Pea has a good understanding of letters, but obviously can’t write yet. I think she was really excited to be able to actually create the letters in another way. She was very proud of her work and wanted me to take a picture of each of the letters she completed. I may even get around to making a lower case set one of these days.
I would highly recommend this for other tots.
Notes from the Trenches:
If this activity is too advanced for your tot, these markers work great for free play too.
The biggest problem with Do-A-Dot markers is that they can be very messy. They just don’t clean up like good old washable Crayola markers. Note that the following picture was taken after we had washed Sweet Pea’s hands several times.
[Update Sept 9, 2012 – One of my commenters suggested that children are not learning how to form the letters in the correct way when they use these. Â For example, they start at the bottom left side of the page when making a B, instead of the upper left side. Â If this bothers you, I Â suggest drawing a star in the circle where you want your tot to start forming the letter.]
Rating: 3 Stars * (Fun, Easy, Independent)
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THANKS for including your templates!! We made our own bingo markers by purchasing bingo bottles and liquid water color. I got them both inexpensively from Discount School Supply. It ends up costing more than if you find the markers at the dollar store, but we use the liquid watercolor for tons of projects. PLUS, ours are washable!!
I love this idea. I bet Bella will, too!
This is great! Do you have lower-case letters?
No, I don’t have any lower-case letters yet, but I do want to do them. I just got the upper case ones done and it took me quite a long time. I’m sorry to say that I probably won’t have the lower case ones finished anytime soon. I wouldn’t expect them before June. Thanks for asking though!
my daughter loves these. is there anyway you can post the rest of the uppercase alphabet. Thanks!
I’m glad your daughter enjoys them!
I’m sorry that my post isn’t more clear about finding the rest of the alphabet, but they are available from this post. Follow the link that is directly after the A B C picture. It says “Click for the rest of my Do-A-Dot Upper Case Alphabet Worksheets.” (I made it bigger so it’s easier to see now.)
Or you can always find all of my worksheets on the printables page. (Click on the link that says Shannon’s Printables in the upper left hand corner of the page.)
Here is a direct link to it for you: Shannon’s Printables.
i love your website and cant wait to do the do a dot alphabet but the link wouldnt show up for the printouts.Can you email me if you get a chance thanks
Kate, I am sorry you are having trouble and have sent you an email. I can’t find a broken link on my site, but here is a direct link again to the page for you: Shannon’s Printables.
I LOVE your do a dot alphabet printables but when I click on the link for the entire alphabet is says that it is no longer there. Can you email that to me somehow or tell me if it was moved? My daughter loves her do a dot and these would be PERFECT! Thanks so much.
I checked and don’t see a problem from here when I click on the link. Maybe it was just a glitch? I’ll email you the link. (http://totschool.shannons.org/?page_id=2360)
Thank you SOOO MUCH for sharing these!
You’re welcome!
Thank you so much for these! I’m so excited to use them in our upcoming school year! Also, the milk cap letters are awesome! I’ve got everybody and their dog collecting milk caps for me! I remember seeing a milk cap alphabet like your do a dot alphabet, but instead of dotting you would place blank milk caps in the dots, now I can’t seem to find the link, would you happen to know where I could find that alphabet? Thanks!
Anna,
Thanks for taking the time to post a comment on my blog. I’m so happy that you are able to use my Do-A-Dot and Milk Cap print outs. You asked if I had something similar to the Do-A-Dot alphabet, but for the milk cap letters, and that just doesn’t ring a bell. Maybe you saw it on another site? I may have seen something like that with magnets… For example, see this set of B letter worksheets on Confessions of Homeschooler.”set of B letter worksheets on Confessions of Homeschooler. The front middle worksheet is the one I am thinking of.
-Shannon
This is so great! My son had a blast. Here is a link to see him working on this activity! Thanks so much for great ideas.
http://theuncommoncomptons.blogspot.com/2011/12/prek-activity-day.html
I love this idea to learn letters and how to write them correctly. I have printed off the capital and lowercase for my toddler and she loves them. I also printed off some of the letter mazes, but realized there were too many letters on the line for my daughter and decided to make my own mazes using larger font with fewer letters on the line-it seemed to help. I love your ideas and have adapted them for my daughter. Thank you for sharing!
I purchased the BINGO markers from the Dollar Tree!
Thank you so much for these lovely printables. We use them with all kinds of materials. I posted a link on my blog and you are more then welcome to visit.
http://bouquinsetblocsdebois.blogspot.ca/2012/07/activites-pour-la-consolidation-des.html
I just started my blog so I don’t know if I’m doing everything right. Please, tell me if there’s something I’m doing wrong.
Thank you very much!!
What a great idea! BUT if you look closely at your photos you see the children are “forming the letters” in the wrong way, that is not doing the first stroke first and then the next (as in A down to the left, down to the right, cross to the middle). As a first grade teacher, my biggest problem with handwriting is that the kids form the letters backwards, bottom up and so on? It is very hard to retrain them to write correctly. Does this matter? It sure does. We are starting to get back to teaching cursive in Grade 2. If they haven’t been trained to form letters in Manuscript properly they will surely have a hard time with cursive.
Thanks for contacting me about my do-a-dot letters! I love getting comments and appreciate you taking the time to leave one for me.
You bring up an interesting point about the direction that the children are stamping on these letters. It was a struggle to create do-a-dot letters because the do-a-dot circles can’t overlay exactly where the lines of the letters are. Many children even fill the circles in randomly, using more than one color of marker. So I consider this activity more of a first exposure to letters than as actual writing practice, but I do understand what you are saying.
I’ve put some thought your problem and I think one solution would be for you to draw a star inside the circle where you want the child should start stamping. What do you think? I hope that helps!
Thanks for these printables! My daughter is loving them!
You’re welcome!
I think these are great. I went in search of them for my daughter to learn the alphabet by sight, she knows by sign. I found out today she can do the do a dot activities, so now I want to step it up a notch.
Thanks! I’m glad that they work for you!
Thank you very much for your accessible printouts. I teach English to toddlers in an immersion school in Japan and they love your dotter letter worksheets!
What an amazing idea!! My 3yr old son who will not sit or draw a straight line loves stamping these dots. His letter recognition is getting much better too. Thanks for all the work on the printables.
I am so happy that these worked for your little guy!
I just wanted to thank you for sharing these. It’s very sweet of you. I’m excited to have my son start doing them. They look great!
You are welcome! Glad you like them!
Thanks sooooo much! I use these for all kinds of things in our playgroup!
Love the template. I put the letter of the week on a cork board and my preschoolers use pushpins to make their letter. It’s a great dexterity and fine motor skill! Thanks!
What a fun way to use these. I’d never heard of doing that before. 🙂
This grandma rocks…thanks for the priceless fun with my 4 year old grandsnon.
Thank you so much for these.
My toddler loved them.
I’m glad that he/she enjoyed them!
This is great! I am printing these pages to send to my 6 year sponsored child in Colombia. She has not been able to go to school yet, so I am sending a few alphabet pages to her in each letter packet. With these pages I think I’ll send some dot stickers!
What a super idea for a gift!
THANK YOU for posting all of the templates! LOVE this idea.. will be trying it out with my preschoolers this week! 🙂
Do you think putting these letters in a sleeve and put them in a binder and re-use them over and over again would work? After they are done with marking the letters they can wipe it off with a cloth. We use different markers that are water soluble and washable so they are easy to clean.
I figured this would save paper and ink
You could put them in a sleeve if you used dry erase markers, but I’m not sure if it would work with regular markers. I haven’t tried it, but my thought is that if you used washable markers, they wouldn’t write on the slick sheet protector very well.
If you do try it with the markers, let me know how it goes!
Shannon
Can you make templates for numbers, please?
My do-a-dot numbers are here: http://totschool.shannons.org/do-a-dot-numbers/
Love this activity! Your post was the first I’d ever seen about Do-a-dot and I got so excited! I don’t have a printer at home so I had planned to make it a point to get them printed on our next library visit, but I just couldn’t wait! My son and I sat down and I ended up free handing the circles for each letter. He’d fill in the dots (in a bit of a mad craze) and then I’d make the next letter while he watched. We both had a great time and got through the whole alphabet 🙂 He also got a kick out of picking something to draw next to each letter. Thanks so much for sharing, can’t wait to Do-a-dot again, just maybe a bit neater next time
I’m so happy that this activity worked for you! Kids seem to really love it! 🙂
Estou encantada com o site, parabéns!
Pena não ter tradução para o Português.
Bj.
I’m not able to get Doty markers is ther anything else I can use
Thanks for asking about the do-a-dot letter activity. Â
I saw an idea for how to make your own dotty marker’s here:Â Â https://teachpreschool.org/2011/07/20/diy-make-your-own-dot-dabbers-for-preschool/Â Â
If that doesn’t work for you, maybe you could use regular round label stickers (https://amzn.to/2YD5Gp2) or similar garage sale stickers? You might be able to find stamp markers or depending on your child’s age, just a regular stamp kit (https://amzn.to/3dzRZLR). You could wad up pieces of colored tissue or cut small circles out of construction paper and show your tot how to glue them into the correct spaces.  Or if none of those are possible, maybe you could just show your tot how color in each circle.Â
I hope one of those ideas would work for you!
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