Teaching Letters to Children

Kids are so curious and eventually they start to show interest in things that they will retain.

After colors and shapes the next natural thing is numbers and letters. Two of my favorite tricks for teaching letters involves food. The other day I had some left over frosting from cupcakes so we got out some plates and I drew letters on their plates. Before they were allowed to eat them they had to attempt to identify them. My younger one isn't that advanced yet so I'd say the name of the letter and he would repeat it. The kids loved it and the sugar high afterword wasn't too bad.

Another eadible idea is Ceez-it Scrabble junior. They make crackers with upper case letters printed on them. I was suprised how excited my almost four year old was when he got to identify the letters before eating each one.k
One more idea is sugar cookie letters. The kids love to help roll out and cut out the dough and you can get a set of cookie cutters fairly inexpensive. If you're not into sugary sweets you could do play dough instead. This also works well for teaching shapes.

One last note, I stuck to upper case letters and it didn't occur to me to teach lower case letters and sounds at the same time. I've been told by teachers the kids use the lower case letters more than upper case when they begin to learn to read. Enjoy eating your letters.