Tag Archives: spelling

Nov16

Sand Art Spelling

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Painting on the glue

I’ve been trying to get T1 excited about spelling, but he’d much rather be off playing video games or jumping on the trampoline.

 

We have actually done a lot of spelling on the trampoline; he says one letter of the word for every jump he does. And we have done lots using other activities, but when I found some tubs of coloured sand, I knew we needed to try making some sand art!

 

Sprinkling on sand

 

We used everyday white glue to paint each word onto a page of paper. T1 chose to do all of his words in red sand. After painting all of the letters in each word, he carefully sprinkled the sand onto the glue. Once there was enough sand to cover all of the glue, T1 tipped the excess sand off into the baking tray we were using underneath the paper (useful for reducing mess)

 

 

Shaking off excess sand

Each word or even letter could be done in different colours if desired. I think it would look good on black paper too. T1 is keen to make his next spelling list into sand art as well!

 

 

Sand art spelling words

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Nov17

Sticker Names

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My preschooler has been learning to write his name. He already recognises his name when it is written, and he knows all of the letters. He can even write the letters quite well, yet putting them together is proving a little challenging!

Adding stickers to his name.

Adding stickers to his name.

To help him practice getting his letters in the right order, we tried this little activity. I drew the letters of his name in bubble writing, and then got him to fill in the letters using stickers (he is sticker crazy!). As he did this, we talked about the letters, and spelt his name aloud several times.

T1 really enjoyed making his sticker name. It’s up on the wall, and he has been going to it and reading the letters out to anyone who is nearby!

This activity could also be used for learning the spelling of any words.

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Sticker name.

 

You may also like Sticker Counting and Alphabet Stamping.

Mar11

Secret Messages

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Crayons, wax and oil pastels are great at repelling water coulour paint. This property makes them a good choice for writing secret messages. White is the best colour to use on white paper as it is hard to see the writing before adding the paint! Unfortunately A chose to use a white oil pastel and our paper was more of a beige colour (blank newspaper print), so the messages weren’t quite as secret as they might have been 🙂

My message for L and A.

My message for L and A.

A wrote out all of the sight words that she is currently working on in white oil pastel. L drew a picture and wrote messages. Then the kids used their water colour paints to bring the messages to life.

Writing her sight words.

Writing her sight words.

Painting on the water colours.

Painting on the water colours.

We had fun writing messages to eachother, which were then ‘discovered’ by adding paint. This is also a great activity for practicing spelling words as well as sight words.

A word 'discovered'.

A word ‘discovered’.

Words appearing through the paint.

Words appearing through the paint.

 

Mar8

Sight Words Finger Painting

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IMG_3893Finger painting last week was so much fun, A asked if we could practice her sight words with finger paint. This time we used ordinary poster paint (Baby T was sleeping), and we squirted some into one of our play tubs. The tub was yellow, so we used green paint as it gave us a good contrast.

Squirts of paint.

Squirts of paint.

Smoothing the paint around the tray.

Smoothing the paint around the tray.

A had a great time spreading the paint around the bottom of the tray, squishing and sliding in it. When she was ready, she smoothed the paint across the bottom of the tray, and then proceeded to use the tip of her index finger to write her words. When she had filled the tray with words, she smoothed the paint over, and wrote some more words.

Writing a word.

Writing a word.

Writing more words.

Writing more words.

Feb28

Rainbow Sight Words

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IMG_3872A has just started kindergarten. To help her with her reading we have been learning sight words. To help her learn and retain these words, we like to do activities with the words, the same way we learn our spelling words.

IMG_3860This week we tried making rainbow words with the sight words. First I wrote each word in large letters on some paper, and then A traced over the letters with different coloured gel pens and pencils. She particularly liked using her sparkly gel pens! Markers, crayons and chalk also work well. A continued tracing over and over the word with different colours to form rainbow letters.

This is a great activity for practicing the letter shapes, learning the words and learning the spelling. It is fun too! IMG_3867

Aug18

Shaving Cream Play

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Shaving cream in a tray.

Shaving cream in a tray.

A very easy activity for kids is letting them play with shaving foam. It’s easy to clean up with water and is lots of fun. It’s not good to eat though, so I prefer not to let Baby T near it, but L and A love squishing their hands into it.

Squishing and squashing.

Squishing and squashing.

Whisking.

Whisking.

We used a couple of plastic trays on top of a muck mat, in an attempt to contain the shaving foam. It’s nice to do this outside if the weather permits, where we can just hose the area down. L and A each had a tray with shaving cream in it. They used various utensils to mix and scoop it, but mostly they just liked to feel it, squish it and squeeze in through their fingers.

Mixing and spreading.

Mixing and spreading.

L pretended the shaving cream was part of her cafe and she made me a smoothie. A whipped her shaving cream up with a whisk, and somehow managed to get shaving cream all the way up her arms and on her face.

We have previously used shaving cream to practice writing spelling words in too. We just smooth a layer of shaving cream in the bottom of a tray, and then write the words using a finger to form the letters.

Messy fun!

Messy fun!

 

Nov18

Pipe Cleaner Spelling

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Cutting the pipe cleaners.

Cutting the pipe cleaners.

Another week, another spelling list! L made her words out of pipe cleaners this week. She cut the pipe cleaners to a suitable length and shaped them into each letter. I got her some paper to stick the pipe cleaner letters to, but she didn’t like getting the glue on her fingers. She asked me to do the gluing so she could stay clean…. I quite like using glue, so it suited me. L made all the letters, and then told me the order in which I needed to glue them down. This meant she practiced the spelling of each word several times during this activity.

Gluing the pipe cleaners down.

Gluing the pipe cleaners down.

It was a bit hard to stick these sheets into her spelling journal, so she took them to school to show her teacher. He was very impressed, and hung them up on the wall. This made L very happy.

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Sep10

Alphabet Stamping

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Last year one of L’s teacher’s leant her a set of alphabet stamps and an ink pad. She had a great time with it, stamping out her name, and the names of everyone in our family, her spelling words, and the alphabet just for fun. So, she was given her very own alphabet stamping set for Christmas. L uses this set regularly to practice her spelling words. She likes to use all four ink colours in each word if she can.

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Sep5

Spelling with Beads

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We like to use plastic beads to make play jewelry, but the beads can be used in a number of different ways too. This week we used them for making L’s spelling words. It was a great fine motor skill activity too, as she had to pick up the individual beads in her fingers and place them carefully to make each letter.

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IMG_1792L also did some sorting of the beads, using one colour for a whole letter. The ‘e’ in course is also done in a pattern of white and blue beads. Using these beads for sorting and pattern making will be a fun maths activity for A some time soon.

Sep5

Sandpit Spelling

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Preparing the sandpit.

Preparing the sandpit.

We cleaned out the sandpit on the weekend. It had various sand toys scattered through it, and there was some grass growing along one edge that needed removing. I think we’ll have to get some more sand for it soon, A has been gradually removing the sand, one shoeful at a time 🙂 Once it was cleared out, L raked it over ready to write her spelling words in the sand. She was going to use a stick as a pencil, but in the end she decided to just use her finger. The words didn’t last long, L dug them up pretty quickly and just played in the sand.

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