Alphabet recognition
For last week and this week, we have made our letter of the day a big part of our morning circle time. We hope it’s been helpful in creating interest in the alphabet at home. I know that here every time a toy is picked up the first question is, “What’s this one’s letter?” This is awesome - without a vested interest in wanting to learn the letters, it’s a big challenge! So that is why we try to find creative ways to interact with the letters. Games, scavenger hunts, matching, memory, drawing, painting, building with blocks - we want the letters to be everywhere without being too obvious about it. Usually when we just have it out and ready, kids pick it up and learn faster than if we drill it into them. So just be relaxed about it, and when the fine motor and cognitive abilities are there, it will all click. If your child isn’t interested, that’s OK! We really don’t expect everyone to know the alphabet by sight until at least 4 years old. There’s plenty of time to play around with the abcs until then.
Drawing/Writing Grasp
This week I was asked about proper grip on a writing tool. At this stage, some of the kids haven’t even decided which hand is going to be dominant and use both. That’s OK! It’s ok if your child wants to palm the markers and crayons, that’s what is most comfortable for him or her right now. Our goal is to slowly move toward a proper pincer grip where the child is using their fingers to pinch the writing tool. I’ll post some pictures.
A great way to practice this grip is to break your crayons in half and only use a tiny piece to draw with. This forces the pincer grip because there isn’t enough crayon to hold in the palm and still draw with.
Again, each child develops in their own time and there isn’t any rush. As long as your child is starting to use shapes and lines and has a desire to describe what it is they are making, you’re on the right track!
Scissors
We had only just started to practice using scissors in the classroom. This is an important skill that we should be mastering around 3 years old (again, this is not set in stone and it’s not realistic for every single child). If you have child scissors at home, please start incorporating them into more and more play. You can draw different kinds of lines on the paper (straight, zigzag, wavy) and try to have your child cut the lines. If your child is having difficulty, just continue to model the proper way to hold them and give something solid like playdough or clay to cut first before moving on to paper.
Hand Muscles
To be successful with hand writing, we want to continue to offer different materials that we need to squeeze, pinch and poke with.
Clay
Glue bottles
Squeeze bottles in the bath tub
Lids to screw and unscrew
Keys/Locks
Putting pipecleaners into colanders or small holes in cardboard
Tweezers
Chop sticks
Free Play
While it’s nice to work on these structured activities, it’s really best to give your child a large opportunity to play creatively in any safe way that they would like. Dramatic play lets children learn wonderful things like being able to get dressed and undressed, how to take care of themselves and others, and how to cope with emotions. Lining up and sorting toys is actually a mathematical and scientific process which is wonderful for cognitive development and curiosity. Block building is basic engineering and architecture and helps to learn all sorts of great concepts, like gravity. No matter what your child is playing with, they are learning!