Today I’m sharing a set of free alphabet action cards – in two different versions!
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A few months ago, I finished teaching my Three the alphabet through our simple letter of the week activities.
She loved it, and is busy writing letters wherever she goes – as you can see in the above story about a “cweepy monster.” 🙂
One thing she hasn’t picked up on is letter sounds; she knows just a few of them. Her older siblings learned these relatively easily as we did our alphabet activities, so I realized that I needed to try something new.
The trick is that it needs to be something that feels like playing, because I am not going to drill my three-year-old on letter sounds.
(Not that it would work anyway.)
As I was studying my book Phonics They Use, by Pat Cunningham, she suggested creating a set of alphabet exercise cards. When you use them enough, children start associating particular letters with an action and eventually learn each letter’s sound.
So … I gave it a try!
There are two versions of cards. When you print this set front to back, you get the lowercase letter on the front …
And you get the action on the back of the card.
G is for go!
R is for read.
X is sort for for mix. (That tricky letter x!)
A is for apple.
I know, I know. Apple isn’t an action word. The only one I could come up with was act, and that wasn’t something my Three was going to understand. I had to get creative with some of the short vowels, but they do have an action associated with them.
A … eat an apple
O… get on something
U… get under something
We had fun using the cards outdoors on a beautiful summer day, but they’re simple enough that you can do them inside, too. This is the other set of cards. They’re single-sided.
You can even “go” in a messy playroom.
Here’s our letter o card. Another one of those tricky letters whose key word isn’t exactly an action. Blame the alphabet.
Getting “on” a box lid.
E is for exercise. That’s a fun one!
So are they working?
Well, we’re having fun. And my Three is getting more practice recognizing lower case letters. I can’t say that it’s helped her learn her letter sounds yet. One thing I do is emphasize the letter sound each time we use a card. “M! /m/, /m/, March!”
We’ll get there. All in good time!
Here are some other ways to use the cards:
- Laminate the cards, hole punch the upper left corner, and put them on a ring. Then go through the cards one by one just for fun.
- Let your child be the teacher. He/she can name each letter, and you do the action. (My Three loves this.)
- After you’ve been doing the cards a while, see if your child can remember the action word before turning the two-sided card over.
- If you really want to use these cards to teach letter sounds, it’s wise to do just a few at a time. Make a big deal about each new key word. Act it out with props. Get silly!
- Lay the cards in alphabetical order on the floor.
- Just let your little one have fun playing!
So how will you use these cards? Let us know in the comments!
P.S. Yes, they ˆ come in both color and black and white.
Have you seen our best-selling letter of the week curriculum?
© 2017, Anna G. All rights reserved.
What a lovely set of alphabet cards-thanks for sharing. My kinesthetic learners will love these! I plan to use them in small groups for letter/letter sound review.
I hope they enjoy them, Marsha!
Hello,
I’m a mom of year old twin and on a tight budget. Im about to purchase your letter of the week curriculum. What else would you reccomand to use as i try to homeschoolmy boys
Hi Lashon! If you send me an email with more information about the ages of your boys and what they already know and do, I can point you in the right direction. 🙂 It’s anna(at)themeasuredmom(dot)com.
I love these action alphabet cards!! They will be a hit with my Kinder class! Thank you so much!!! 🙂
I’m so glad to hear that, Daniela!
I plan to put these on a ring and flip through the letters of the week when we need a brain break in my kindergarten class.
Love that idea! 🙂
Thank you, Anna, your resources are always beneficial.
Regards
Beata
You’re welcome, Beata!
Thank you very much for this great lesson, it will definitely help me homeschool my boy this holiday.
I’m so glad to hear that, Cindy!
Thank you so very much Anna. These resources are very useful , especially to our lower learners!
That’s great to hear, Celeste!
It’s awesome. Thanks a lot!
You’re welcome, Elena!
These are awesome for preschoolers when they need to exercise or move around from sitting too long. With school starting soon they will be very helpful and I like the idea of putting them on a card and ring. Very helpful
I’m glad you can use these, Donna!
These are great cards to use for outside movement activities. Thanks for sharing!
You’re welcome, Dana!
What a way to learn while moving. l love it! Thanks
I hope you get a chance to use them, Katherine!
I love that these cards have the lowercase letters on them. Most of the cards available for youngers are uppercase. The clipart is adorable, and since I’m a big fan of multi-sensory teaching, I love having the picture, the word, and a motion all on one card! Thank you!!
Yay – I’m glad you like them, Sharyl!
Love the alphabet card activities.
I’m happy to hear it! 🙂
Thanks again, Anna! Yet one more resource that I can pull out for alphabet review. I will probably use these whole-group and we will just do the motions you provide in your pictures.
I have some teeny tiny abc exercise cards in black and white that my kids have loved, but yours are larger and more colorful and therefore more attention-grabbing.
THANKS SO MUCH FOR ALL YOU DO.
Thank you so much for your feedback, Jennifer! I hope your learners enjoy these! 🙂
They are brilliant cards my grand children are picking up the Alphabet quicker then the normal way of teaching. I have printed out both the colour and black and white as I thought the black and white would come in handy as a useful colouring activity. Brilliant cards I love them
I’m thrilled you can use them, Joan!
Thank you so much. My students will love it.
You’re very welcome, Maria!