Sensory ways to explore letters

We have been playing lots of games recently involving letters and alphabet, to help princess learn without even knowing it. This post focuses on sensory ways we used to explore the letters in Princess' name.

We made some no cook playdough and while Princess was playing with it, I drew the outlines of her letters. She then made some playdough worms and shaped them to fit in the letters. Lots of wiggly playdoughy fun.

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We used different coloured chalks to practice how the letters in her name are formed by writing her name on the stepping stones in the lawn. Princess then traced over each letter several times, using a different colour each time. This really helped her with learning to write the letters, but also forming the letters herself has helped her recognition too.

Incidentally, you might notice in the picture that Princess has shaving foam all over her arm. This is because we had just tried drawing letters in a tray of shaving foam. This did not work for us at all, as Princess was in sensory overload I think! All she wannted to do was spread it all over her arms! Bur at least she had fun!

I made Princess some letter cards with glitter to help her practice how the letters should be correctly written. Who doesn't love seeing their name in sparkly glitter! I drew each letter then painted over it with glue before tipping on the glitter. I added a star to show princess where to start on each letter. To stop the glitter from getting everywhere, I painted another layer on glue over the top when it was dry and it has sealed it nicely.

I showed princess how to draw each letter starting at the star. The feel of the glitter as she traces the letter evokes more senses and enables her to remember it on another level. We now have these stuck to the kitchen door so she can trace them regularly. As Princess is left handed, she seems to have a tendency to write the letters backwards, so this is good practice for her to remember how the letters should look.

Her letter recognition has come on so much since doing these activities, the can now type her name on a computer without any help, and is starting to be able to write her name. It's not quite obvious what she has written yet but if you know it's her name, you can definitely make out that she has made the letter shapes. And the main thing is that she enjoyed herself!