If your child enjoys play dough, he or she will love the activity I’m featuring in today’s installment of my 101 Ways to Teach the Alphabet Series. With a ball of play dough and some cut up straw pieces, your child will be learning letters and developing fine motor skills while having a lot of fun.
I call today’s activity making letters with straws and play dough.
For this activity, you need some play dough and a bunch of cut up straw pieces. I cut my straw pieces to about 2″ tall. Then I put the materials on a tray.
My daughter began by flattening out a ball of play dough to a pancake about 1″ thick. The exact thickness of the pancake isn’t important, as long as it is thick enough to stick the straws and keep them standing upright.
I provided XGirl with some sandpaper letters to give her a model for the letter she was to create.
She selected straws and poked them into the play dough in the shape of a ‘v.’
Then I gave her another letter to copy, and she began again.
This time she made a ‘d.’
If the play dough pancake gets too thin or hole-y to support more straws, your child simply needs to gather it into a ball and flatten it again. Then it will be ready for more letters!
Have questions about teaching the alphabet? We’ve got answers! Click here to learn more.
More ways to teach to the alphabet
More alphabet posts from Gift of Curiosity:
- Letter hunt sensory bin
- Erasing letters with a Q-tip
- I spy letter hunt
- Spaghetti letters
- Letter puzzles
- Making “alphabet soup”
- Smash the puffy letters
- Kinetic sand letters
- Letter hopscotch
- Crystallized letters
- Letter hop
- Letter tic-tac-toe
- Rainbow letters
You can find more ways to teach the alphabet on my Literacy Activities for Kids page and my Letter Learning Pinterest board.
Follow Katie @ Gift of Curiosity’s board Learning Letters on Pinterest.
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Diana Avallone says
May 20, 2016 at 11:20 amCute & Creative Ideas!!! 🙂