Alphabet Eggs

Now that Nathan is older, there is no way that he wants to miss out on the fun when Naomi and I do "school". I put school in quotes because really, with as much fun as we have, it seems almost wrong to call it school! :-) I DO call it school though, especially the fun stuff, because I want the kids to have a very positive attitude towards school, and who doesn't love doing hands on things and having fun? Anyways, I digress!

Since Nathan wants to do school with us, I make a big effort to always have something ready for him to do as well. One of my very favorite sites, No Time For Flashcards, is starting a new series called "Alphabet for Starters". I am THRILLED because I know the type of activities they come up with will be tons of fun, and perfect for where Nathan is at. Here is the first post in the series, and as soon as I saw it, I knew we had to do it! Here is what we did.

First I got some of our larger Easter eggs, and filled 8 of them with the magnetic letters from our Leapfrog fridge set. Then I put them in this cute bucket, and put it on a cookie sheet so they would stick to the tray. Since letters are pretty new to Nathan I added the device the letters go into so he could hear the names of the letters from it and from me.

I added in one sweet boy, and he got right to work opening up the eggs. Opening up the eggs is a great workout for their little fingers too!

 

As soon as he opened up an egg, he put the letter in the box to  hear what it was. He could get them in but as you can see by his frown, it took a little concentration!

 

He liked hearing what letter it was, but then he quickly wanted to move to hearing the ABC song again, as you can see by him pushing that button.

 

Nathan enjoyed this so much that we're going to do it again, only I'm going to put some of our different shapes in it. I want to end this by saying in no way did I drill Nathan on his letters, or do I think that is appropriate for a 22 month old! This was a fun activity that gave he and I something special to do together, and was a great way to expose him to some letters. We talked about the letters as he opened the eggs, and moved them around on the tray, but that was it. Fun and exposure it what I think it's all about at this stage!

Karla