Learning Letters with a 3-Year-Old

Learning letters is one of the basics of early education, and incorporating letters into playful activities is a great way to start kids on the road to learning their letters without a lot of pressure.

The Measured Mom did a great series of letter of the week posts that she did with her three-year-old son. They include activities for forming the letters in playdough, writing them in sensory materials, art projects, activity sheets using dot markers, little books and more.

There are so many great ideas here for activities, even if you don’t necessarily do them in order or related to a letter of the week study. For instance, potato printing, making lacing cards shaped like letters, an I-spy sensory bin and making monsters out of play dough would all be fun for littles anytime.

If you have a preschooler at home or teach little ones, you’ll want to keep this list handy for a lot of quick activities that make learning fun and introduce kids to letters without stress (for either of you).

Do you have any favorite letter-related activities? I’d love to hear about them.

[Photo via the Measured Mom.]

Check out these Alphabet Learning Games we found on Amazon.

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Easy Sensory Activities for Valentine's Day

The celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is important throughout Mexico and other parts of the world. Her feast day is Dec. 12, and the celebrations honoring her appearance to Juan Diego in 1531 begin a few days before that.

Whether you celebrate yourself or just want to share about the celebration at home or in your classroom, Las Mañanitas: The Beautiful Celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a good place to start. The book, by Ernesto Joel Vega Rosales and Jeanette Gonzalez Seneviratne, with illustrations by Dana Sanmar, tells the story of a family’s celebration of the feast day in both English and Spanish.

They prepare with a novena, which is nine days of prayers and preparations. The children, Lucia and Pablo, are given special outfits made by their grandmother that look like what Juan Diego might have worn when he saw Our Lady. The book describes the prayers that are made each day, such as a prayer for respect for life, for families and for the indigenous people of the Americas, to name a few.

As told in the book, Juan Diego was a native Mexican born near modern day Mexico City. His given name was Cuaauhtlatoatzin, which means “He who speaks like an eagle.” When he converted to Christianity his name was changed to Juan Diego, and as he walked to church he passed a hill called Tepeyac. One day he heard the birds singing especially beautifully and a voice called him to go to the top of the hill.

There he saw Our Lady of Guadalupe, who asked him to tell the bishop she wanted a chapel built in her name at the foot of the hill. The bishop asked for a sign that Juan Diego really saw her, and later she had him collect flowers that she blessed and take them to the bishop. When Juan Diego dropped the flowers, an image of Our Lady could be seen on his cloak, which is still on display in her basilica to this day.

The feast day is celebrated as mañanitas, which includes singing, indigenous music and dancing, and children presenting flowers to Our Lady. Juan Diego is remembered today as being humble, brave and faithful, and was the first indigenous American made a saint.

The book is colorful and tells the story in a clear way, and it’s fun to have it both in English and Spanish if you teach Spanish or speak Spanish at home or in the classroom. It’s a great way to learn the basics of the celebration and the story of Juan Diego and why he is still remembered today.

About the book: 40 pages, paperback, published 2024 by Loyola Press. Suggested retail price $14.99.

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