Letter N: Activities (ages 3 & 20 months)
Here's our Letter N Activities for a three year old and a 20 month old:
Read, Read, Read. I love reading to my kids on a daily basis. I'll usually alternate reading during a meal time, before naps or randomly in the day. I checked out our Letter N Booklist at the library a week in advance. The picture above were our very favorite books, but you view more great Letter N books by clicking on the booklist link.
Read Letter N Book. We also love to read these Little Letter Books from The Measured Mom. For my three, we focus on the big and little letters at the beginning of each page. My 20 month old especially loves these books! He enjoys looking at the pictures and repeating the words after me on each page.
Letter N Songs & Rhymes. This year, I'm putting together an interactive set of songs & rhymes for each letter of the alphabet. My three and my 20 month old mostly learn and love action songs the best, so we are doing mostly those (without a lot of props) now. Click the link to view our Letter N Songs & Rhymes. If you're looking for something more simple without actions and props, take a look at this printable set of songs and rhymes from The Measured Mom.
Writing Practice. Every child is different, but my three loves writing letters! We practiced writing the Letter N's with "Letters of All Sizes" from The Measured Mom. I printed and slipped ours into a sleeve protector, so my three could erase and write these over again if he wanted. While my three practiced writing N's, my 20 month old used power magnets to cover a Letter N. "Can you cover this Letter N?"
Craft #1: N is for Nest from The Measured Mom. These crafts turned out pretty similar, so I'm posting my three year olds above. We used dot markers to stamp the paper plate (nest) and glued everything into place. My three loved making four birds instead of three and using colored googly eyes.
Craft #2: N is for Night Sky from Fantastic Fun and Learning. I love how these turned out! I cut out a letter N from black construction paper. This is an open ended craft as my boys used different ideas with their glitter glue. My three left the glitter glue as is and my 20 month old smeared his onto the N. Both turned out so neat. We glued a moon into place and stuck star stickers on once the glitter glue dried. We found our glitter glue and star stickers at the Dollar Tree.
Craft #3: Glowing Noodle Necklaces. My boys and I painted rigatonni noodles with florescent paint. Once the paint dried, we strung the noodles onto a string and watched our necklaces glow under a black light. I found our florescent paint at Walmart. If you have extra paint, check out how to make glow paint in the tub.
Color Review - Usborne Lift the Flaps Colors Book. My mom bought us this book this week, so I decided to use it as our color review activity. It's one of the best flap books we own, with over 60 flaps to open, each teaching a color. The illustrations are darling.
Math - Newt Shape Review. My boys loved our "Little Mouse" color review activity for Letter M, so I decided to make the game into a shapes game this week. I printed and taped shapes onto a cookie sheet and hid a newt (yes, I could have printed a better picture) underneath one of the shapes. My three would say the shape and my twenty month old would mostly point, although he's doing so great at identifying and saying shape names. Both boys LOVED this.
Math - Feed the Squirrel (from The Measured Mom) and Number Dots Book (from Mess for Less). I couldn't decide which number activity to do this week, so we did both! I printed the squirrel cards and my three drew a card, identified the number and placed the same amount of nuts on the card. My twenty month old doesn't know numbers yet, so I did numbers 1-3 for him with him on my lap. Lots of repeating numbers and counting for him to hear. We have to start somewhere, right? I taped the squirrel cards 1-3 on the fridge, and I'll ask him the identify the number as we walk by throughout the week. The numbers book was used as a quiet time activity for my three.
Sensory Play - Letter N Sensory Bin. This was a little random sensory bin, so I was excited to see how my kids would play. My hope was that my boys would somehow make Nests (letter N word) with the birds and eggs. Click the link above to learn how to color noodles and get links for the supplies we used.
Letter Nn Activity #1 - Find the N from The Measured Mom. My three placed power magnets on big and little N's (pictured on the right) and my twenty month old placed power magnets on only big N's, with help (pictured on the left).
Letter N Science - Bubbly Numbers. This was definitely one of the MOST FUN science experiment we've done so far! It's a classic baking soda and vinegar experiment. You can get a tutorial and read all about it by clicking the link above.
Alphabet as a Whole - Nail the Letter. I bought two cardboard poster boards at the Dollar Tree, so each boy could have their own. For my three, I wrote all the letters and he had fun hammering "nails" (golf ball tees) into the poster board while identifying the letter. I tried to have him tell me as many letter sounds as he could, without interrupting the fun. For my twenty month old, I wrote mostly N's and a few other letters (A, B, C, L, M). He also enjoyed pounding the nails. They did this activity for quite a long time.
And that's it!
