Letter Crafting: M



    Recently I have taken on the project of teaching my four-year-old how to read. After much research, I decided to use the Distar reading program. This program was described as a very forward way of teaching. No fancy tricks or reward systems. In fact, a former teacher recommended the book, Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons written by Engelmann, Haddox, and Bruner. As if the title didn't say it all, this book simplifies all the twenty-minute lessons. The words you use for approaching the lesson are highlighted and even directions for correcting a child's misstep are clearly listed as the lesson unfolds. My four-year-old is sounding out words and we are only on lesson 7 as of today! She is so engrossed with the unraveling of a word when sounding it all out, and the best part is, I'm not stressing how to approach correcting her! We are loving it!

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons written by: Siegfried Engelmann, Phyllis Haddox, and Elaine Bruner

     The one point that I wish this process included was a bit of creativity. I know I love the simplicity of it, but I also love those little crafts that fit with a lesson oh so well. I took it upon myself to do something fun as we went through the lessons. So we started an alphabet book. Creating fun with letters while expressing their sounds. After the craft, the kids love recalling the work they did in order to remember some of the sounds we are learning. While learning the short M sound, we created a craft depicting our upper and lowercase as words we associate with this short M sound.



To complete this craft you will need:



  • Construction paper
  • liquid glue
  • googly eyes
  • pom poms
  • scissors
  • monopoly/fake dollar bill
  • marker
Instructions: 

  1. Ask children to write their names on their construction paper. This is how I start every project as it helps them practice writing their name and reinforces the idea of how best to claim ones' work. 
  2. Supervise each child as they use safety scissors to cut along the lines of the stenciled out M. 
  3. Aid children in the application of glue to the underside of the cut-out M and placement upon their own paper.
  4. At this point, we made a list of things that start with the mmm sound. With some direction, we were able to include the words monster and money to our list.
  5. Next help each child write or trace a lowercase m on the monopoly money.
  6. Ask them to cut out the lowercase m and help with the use of scissors.
  7. Next, I allowed them to create silly and spooky monsters out of their uppercase M with google eyes and pom-poms for patchy fur. 
  8. Finally, the children were able to add final touches with markers such as drawing mouths full of teeth and adding horns on their monsters.
  9. Once we allowed the project to dry we had fun telling stories about what our monsters would spend their little bit of money on!



 I hope this craft was just as fun and memorable for your little ones as it was for mine. We'd love to see how your work turned out too! Be sure to follow us on Facebook or Instagram to share your letters and progress in your alphabet books! We will continually add letter crafts to our blog site at Waking Woolslayer. Next week we are working on the letter S!

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