With our ABC mat currently set up on the floor, I wanted to do a little letter learning and phonics review today. This game can be tailored to just about any age; young toddlers can simply learn their letters, but it’s a phonics review and more like charades for older kids!
I pulled out our bag of wooden alphabet blocks, which are fun because they feature not just letters but also pictures of objects.
The task for Travis, as the big kid, was to pick a picture and act it out. He got silly with this, including curling up like an apple!
Others were more obvious, whether buzzing like a bee or making animal noises.
Then he had to put the block on the letter that matched the word’s beginning sound.
Little siblings will want to get in on the charades, too!
Then, to tailor it to Veronika’s age, I showed her how to match up letter to letter, rather than picture to letter.
Check out our other recent alphabet mat fun here!
Then we made two circus games, a 
It’s too bad the circus wasn’t in town, or we would have taken in a show as our field trip. As always, we love circuses that feature human performers, 
My intention was to gather items we could put in a pile, but he spotted some I wouldn’t have thought of, including the knobs on the dresser and other circular furniture or decorations. 
Once we’d finished, he exuberantly asked for a triangle treasure hunt – why not? For fine motor skills, trace some of the circle objects you found.
We also scooped up a pair of tiny hand cymbals from the toy store, perfect for smashing together. Conveniently, the cymbals are circles too!
He then turned it into a game of store, telling me in cents how much each item cost. A great little math and currency lesson.
Unfortunately the game didn’t work for us: even using our strongest magnet wand, the high iron cereal didn’t budge! 
I would be very curious what cereal the online testers had used. Ah well, leftover cereal made for a great sensory bin. 
Then we used the boxes for 
Later we decided that our city needed a parking lot for all the cars – which turned into a 
If you’re able, follow up with a field trip to a real city, whichever is closest to you!
This turned out to be a happy coincidence as the suggested guiding word from 
Then we made a 
Finally, we built a sandpaper sandcastle, an activity 
It was neat to do this now, with Travis much more in charge of where each piece of his sandcastle went on the paper!
We continued the fun at home by making 
Then snuggle up and talk about how there can be a bond between two people as well!
We also read 
Could we also scatter tissue paper across a tabletop with our breath? 
Then head outside and hold up tissue paper into the wind – Travis loved the way it twisted and turned! 
For a neat art project, drip a little liquid watercolor onto a piece of paper. Blow through a straw to scatter the watercolor into gorgeous patterns.
We tried to make 
To finish our focus on the word, we made a 
You can also make a stop sign with the word writ large for your child, and set up a town with cars and roads.
Supervise closely, as you’ll likely need to stand your child on a bathroom counter for this. Then we experimented by 
We also toyed around with variations on the word “sticky” by pulling out an old favorite game – a collage of random craft materials on sticky contact paper.
Phonics Book of the Week: 
First things first, Travis traced O and W on his 
Once we had a huge pile of flower pictures, we used a glue stick to craft a gorgeous “Flower Show” on green construction paper. Travis loved deciding where each picture should go, and was very into mixing colors and big flower/small flowers!
In addition to our phonics title, we read the silly book Click Clack Moo: Cows that Type by Doreen Cronin. If you’re lucky, you might even see a plOW while you visit the cows!
You can also emphasize the word this week as you drive around town!
joyful parenting 