A basket full of (alphabet) letters

The children in Kohavim found a basket full of magnetic alphabet letters today. Children took turns looking through the basket to find the letters they needed to spell their names. Searching for particular alphabet letters demonstrates how the children are able to visually discriminate between letters that may look similar such as E and F or C and G. The children enjoyed spelling their names and creating strings of alphabet letters. After placing the alphabet letters on the chalkboard, the children wanted to read their words. They moved a pointer from left to right, revealing their beginning understanding of the directionality of print, as the teachers read their names and strings of letters aloud. It was such a treat to see how the basket full of alphabet letters inspired such fun, organic literacy play.

BINGO!

At the manipulative table, the Kohavim children have been playing Alphabet Bingo. They each take turns being the caller and race to cover their boards first. While playing the children identify both upper case and lower case letters. The caller reads the letter he/she has chosen and then shows the children the card. The players then have to look at their individual board, which is filled with eight different letters, and determine if they have the alphabet letter that was called. The most exciting part is when you have filled your entire board and can shout, "BINGO!" 

Alphabet Soup

Dylan and Hannah follow the
recipe for Alphabet soup.

Something delicious has been cooking in our dramatic play area this week- Alphabet Soup! The chefs have been referring to a recipe book and following the instructions to prepare the soup. Some children even developed their own recipes, such as, chocolate alphabet soup, fruit soup, and lemon alphabet soup. Using a recipe book in our dramatic play area provides a meaningful and real opportunity for children to interact with literacy during their play. While interacting with the wooden alphabet letters, children were identifying the upper case alphabet letters, finding their initials, and stringing letters together and asking teachers to sound their letter strings out. What a yummy way to develop our alphabet knowledge and interact with books! 

Jacob created his own Alphabet soup
recipe that had lots of different fruits!