How do you keep the alphabet fresh and fun for a preschooler who knows all his or her letters? Search for the letters outside, of course! This nature activity will challenge your child’s brain to see letters in whole new ways, all while getting some fresh air.

Take about a crisp fall day – we needed to pull out our winter coats, but the sunshine was gorgeous.

First we made a list of the alphabet so we could keep track as we hunted. This is a good chance to review all the letters, or sing the ABC song if your child is learning alphabetical order.

If your child has a camera or nature notebook, this hunt is also a great opportunity to use both! Travis is so proud whenever he takes pictures, although I had my camera, too, to catch closeups of the letters we spotted.

Don’t try and find the letters in order – you’ll drive yourselves crazy. Instead, we stretched our eyes and imaginations, and saw what came to us.

A few are easy, like x’s and A’s.

Don’t forget to look up! There was a D in the curve of the branches when we looked up at this tree.

Travis thought the three holes in this leaf looked like an M

 

If we squinted, this funny shape in a tree’s trunk became a Q.

Y’s are relatively easy to spot (think of Y-shaped sticks), but we liked finding them in shadows, too.

We loved this spiderweb sparkling in the sunshine. No letter was immediately evident, but perhaps you can make out E’s or F’s marching along the side.

In sum, this hunt was a great way to spend the afternoon outside together, and sneak in some learning! We didn’t find every letter, but we had fun trying.