A l p h a b e tA c t i v i t i e s

ALL ABOUTTHE

ALPHABET

Created by Travis Hutchens

Introduction

Literacy FoundationsFor students to be successful in literacy, they must start with a strong foundation. Thefirst step to any literacy program is learning, using, and mastering the alphabet. This isa primary focus in many Kindergarten classrooms. It is important to keep alphabetactivities varied, short, and wholesome. Generally, students enjoy working with theletters of the alphabet. There are many ways to work with letters, and we can easilyspread alphabet activities across the curriculum by incorporating art, games, counting,and cooperative activities.

The ActivitiesAll of the activities listed in this packet are tried and true student favorites. These aremy go-to activities when I am needing an extra center activity, a whole-class activity, orwhen I need to fill a 10 minute block of class time. All of these activities requirematerials that are readily available at home or at school, and they are meant to be quickadd-ons to your curriculum. There are 4 categories of resources included in this packet.They are listed and described below.

Beginning Letter RecognitionThese activities reinforce students knowledge of letter recognition. Students willwrite, trace, and create letters with various types of media. Students will also beginto work with beginning sounds by identifying objects and pictures whose namesbegin with a specific letter sound.

Alphabet ArtThe activities in this section combine letter instruction and arts and crafts. Studentswill draw letters, paint letters, decorate letter patterns, and construct letters usingvarious craft materials. This section has a great focus on letter formations and canhelp with handwriting.

Alphabet GamesStudents love playing games - as individuals, with partners, or with the whole class.This section has a great emphasize on letter recognition and partner letter matching.

Tabletop Letter FunThis section offers activities that can be completed on a desktop. These activitiescan be done with students working on their own, with a partner, in small-groups, oras a whole class. Many of these activities focus on letter formation and letterrecognition.

1 © 2012 Travis Hutchens

Beginning Letter RecognitionBelow are a few suggested activities for establishing and improving beginning letterrecognition. Use these activities during centers, circle time, in small-groups, or at home!

Cookie MonsterLet students use alphabet cookie cutters and play dough to create letter cookies. Havestudents make their names, classmates names, sight words, or new vocabulary words.

Head, Shoulders, Knees & the ABCsLet small groups of students use their bodies to create letters from the alphabet.Children can lay down, curl up, or stretch out on the floor. Take pictures from above sothat students can see the letter they made.

Goin' On a Letter HuntWrite letters on index cards and hide them around the room. Let individual studentssearch for a specific letter. Use clues such as "hot" and "cold" to help students find theirway to the letter card.

Photo ExpressTake your students on a walk outside or through the school to look for objectsbeginning with a specific letter sound. When students find an object, use a Polaroidcamera to take a picture of the item. Try to get a few pictures. When you get back to theclassroom, let groups of students tape the pictures onto sheets of construction paperand write the object word underneath the photo. Students can decorate the pages.Compile the pages into a Letter "B" photo book (or whichever letter you are focusingon).

Salty WritingFill a shoebox lid with a layer of salt (or sugar). Let students practice writing letters inthe salt.

Letter BugsUse chenille stems to create letter bugs. First, make a letter with chenille stems. Then,cut some stems into small pieces. Use the small pieces to add legs and antennas to theletter bugs. You can glue them onto a craft stick to make little letter bug puppets.

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Beginning Letter Recognition- continued -

Pretzel CapitalsUse pretzel sticks to practice making capital letters. Break pretzel sticks in half for"little lines". Eat the pretzels when the activity is finished.

Humpty Dumpty LettersTrace large letter templates onto poster board. Cut out the letters. Cut each letter intosmaller pieces (judge the number of pieces based on your students ability level). Letstudents put the letters "back together again."

Dot-To-DotWith students working as partners, have each student create a dot-to-dot puzzle fortheir partner to complete. They should draw a letter using only dots. Partners switchpuzzles and trace over the dots to create the letter. Students can then use craftmaterials to decorate the letters.

Crafty LettersSet out a large number of craft sticks. Let students construct capital letters using thecraft sticks. See if each child can spell their first name, in all capitals, using the craftsticks. Certain capital letters contain curves (B, D, C, etc.) and cannot be made with thestraight craft sticks. In this case, let students use strips of yarn to create the curves.

Sandpaper SpellingTrace letter templates onto sandpaper. Let students cut out the sandpaper letters.Students can manipulate the letters on a workmat to create names, sight words, orvocabulary words. Let students trace the sandpaper letters with their fingers. (This alsomakes an excellent tactile book!)

3 © 2012 Travis Hutchens

Alphabet ArtBelow are some great craftivities to use in your art center. You can also complete these

craftivities when teaching specific letters throughout the school year.

Decorating LettersTrace large letter patterns on light cardboard. Brainstorm with students, some objectsthat have a beginning sound of the focus letter. Collect these items through small toys,clipart, or magazine photographs. Glue the objects onto the cardboard letter pattern.Display the letters around the room.

Letter MosaicsLet students look through magazines to find specific letters. Instruct students to cut outthe letters in a square shape. Once a few letters are cut, have students arrange theletter squares on a sheet of paper and glue them down, making a mosaic. Studentscould also simply create letter collages.

Writing on the WallWrite letters on the sidewalks or walls outside of your school using sidewalk chalk.Students love to write their letters nice and big. There is no clean up, because the raintakes care of this for you!!

Stitch-a-LetterMake letter patterns out of light cardboard or paper plates. Using a hole punch, makeholes around the edge of the letter, about 1 inch apart. Give students some yarn and letthem stitch up the letters. You can place a piece of tape around one end of the yarn tocreate a stiff starting point. Tie off the yarn when finished, and proudly display thestitch-a-letter's.

Paint Me a LetterGive each student a piece of paper and some painters tape. Let students create a letteron their papers using the painters tape. (Capital letters, or letters with sticks are bestfor this activity.) Set out some tempera paint and paintbrushes. Direct students to painttheir entire paper, in whichever way they want. Once the papers have dried, let studentsremove the painters tape to reveal their letter.

4© 2012 Travis Hutchens

Alphabet Art- continued -

Mystery LettersStudents can complete this activity while working with a partner. Students should use awhite crayon and draw two or three "invisible" letters onto a sheet of white paper.Trade papers. Use watercolors and paintbrushes to paint the page. The letters will popout and reveal themselves when they are covered with the paint.

SpongeBob LettersLet students use a set of alphabet sponges and tempera paint to make letter collages.Dip the sponges into the paint and print letters onto a sheet of bond paper. Studentscan do individual letters, names, or words.

Wax SticksSet out some wax sticks. Encourage students to bend the wax sticks around the createdifferent uppercase and lowercase letters. Students can stick the wax letters onto asheet of paper, onto their desks, or all over the chalkboard!

Letters Made From ClayShow students how to form logs out of clay by rolling it between your hands and atable. Form the logs into letters.

5 © 2012 Travis Hutchens

Alphabet GamesUse these educational-based games to practice and reinforce alphabet knowledge and

phonemic awareness.

Letter ConcentrationMake two sets of letter cards (A-Z) on halved index cards. One set should be uppercaseand the other set is lowercase letters. For the game, choose which letters you want toinclude. You can use the entire alphabet or only specific letters. Once the cards arechosen, place them face down on the table. The game is played with partners. For aturn, a student flips over two cards, trying to find a matching set of letters. When amatching pair is found, the student collects the cards. The person with the most cardsat the end of the game is the winner.

Letter BingoCreate letter bingo cards for students. To create a card, cut a sheet of paper in half.Dive the card into 5x5 squares. At the top of the card, rather than using the letters ofthe word BINGO, color in each of the 5 horizontal boxes with a different color for eachbox. Then, fill the rest of the boxes with letters. Be sure students understand how toplay the game. Begin calling out random letters for students. We use Cheerios as ourcover-ups. Each winner gets a piece of candy.

Letter LottoStudents can play this game on their own. You will need a playing mat, divided into nine1" squares and a set of nine 1" cards. Fill the squares on the mat with letters you want topractice. Then, fill the small cards with the same letters. Students play the game byplacing a little card onto the correct square on the playing mat. You can make the gamemore challenging by doing uppercase and lowercase letters, by putting in some trickcards into the little card deck, or by making a larger playing mat. The way to win thegame is up the teacher. Students may be required to get 4 corners, a row/column, or fillall of the boxes with letter cards. Store the mats and cards in zip baggies.

Flashlight LettersYou can play this game with the whole class. Turn off all the lights in the room. Use aflashlight to "draw" large letters on the wall or chalkboard. Students try to guess theletter. The first student to correctly guess the letter gets a turn with the flashlight. Weplay this game until every students has had a chance to draw a letter.

6© 2012 Travis Hutchens

Alphabet Games- continued -

Letter SearchGive each student a section of newspaper and a colored marker. Call out a letter to theclass. Students should search their section of newspaper for the letter. Once they havefound the letter, they should circle it with their marker and stand up. After all studentshave found the letter, they sit back down and you call out another letter for them tosearch for. Play this game for as long as students maintain interest.

Letter ClotheslineThis game reinforces letter matching and partner letters. Take two chairs and placethem back to back up against a wall. Place a string between the two chairs to act as theclothes line. Write letters on the the ends of clothespins using a permanent marker.Place 10 letters at a time on the clothesline. Ahead of time, prepare some paper socksby cutting templates out of white construction paper. Write the matching letters on thesocks. Place the socks in a basket. One at a time, students will come up and take a sockfrom the basket. They must find the clothespin with the matching letter and pin the sockon the clothesline. Continue the game until all of the socks have been hung up.

Letter MailThis game can be played with individual students or in small groups. Take 3 shoe boxesand cut slits in the tops of the lids, large enough to accommodate a small envelope. Onindex cards, write capital letters, one letter per card. Tape the cards to the tops of theshoeboxes. Gather a small stack of envelopes. Write the matching lowercase letters onthe envelopes (You could write names with the first letter being the target letter). Letstudents pretend to be mail carriers and deliver the mail to the correct mailbox.

Letter BasketsWhen introducing a new letter, try this fun activity with individual students. On a smalllaundry basket, tape and index card with the focus letter written on it. Let the studentcarry the basket around the room and collect items whose names begin with the soundof the focus letter. See which student in your class or small group can find the mostitems.

7 © 2012 Travis Hutchens

Tabletop Letter FunEach of these activities is designed to be completed on a table top or at a student desk. Theseactivities can be done with the whole class or individually. When working with individual

letters, it is best to begin with letters in a child's name.

Raised LettersLet students connect with letters through the sense of touch. Print large letters ontoindex cards (one letter per card). Cover the letters with a line of white glue. Allow theglue to harden. Students can now use their fingers to trace the letter. They should beable to feel a raised letter as they trace. NOTE: Add food coloring to the glue beforeoutlining the letters to make the letters bright and vibrant.

Yarn LettersBegin like the activity described above. Instead of letting the glue harden, let studentsplace strips of yarn onto the glue lines. You can use this activity to make full decks ofactivity cards for students to play with during literacy or ABC centers.

Tabletop LettersUse masking tape or painters tape strips to write a students name on their desktop.Have students trace each letter with their finger as you say the name of the letter aloud.

Letter PrintsThis is a continuation of the Tabletop Letters activity above. Lay a piece of paper on topof the taped letters. Let students peel the wrapper from a crayon. Students should usethe side of the crayon to do a letter rubbing. Once they are finished, then can removetheir papers to reveal their prints. (This activity provides an excellent opportunity tointroduce the "Helper Hand" and the importance of keeping our papers stabilized as wewrite or draw.)

Cover the LettersThis activity is also done with the masking tape letters form the Tabletop Letters activityabove. Set out some small objects and allow students to cover the masking tape letters.They can count how many objects it takes to cover each letter. Some examples of itemswould be Cheerios, raisins, buttons, pennies, cotton balls, linking cubes, etc.

8© 2012 Travis Hutchens

Thank You!!Thank you for downloading this resource. Please letme know if you have any questions, comments,corrections, or any additional ideas that you feelshould have made it into this book. Feel free to

contact me through TpT or by email at:

thutchens89@gmail.com.

No copyright infringement intended.

All rights reserved. © 2012 Travis Hutchens

ALL ABOUT THE ALPHABETCreated by: Travis Hutchens

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