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We begin our kindergarten year with Alphabet Bootcamp! We start off reading Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, and we closely look at all of the letters. The kids learn that letters make sounds! Then Clifford stops by with a surprise! He brings magic letter beans (M&M's) in a glass jar. He whispers a magical spell in my ear that the kids repeat, "Boppity boo! Dippity detters! We are ready to learn our letters!" The kids hold their hands out and wiggle their fingers. At the end of the spell, I shake the jar all over the place, shouting, "It's working! It's working!" The kids go wild!!!! I ask Clifford to make them stop shaking, and he does. Shew! Then I place one magic bean in each child's hand. I ask them to put the bean on their tongues and not to bite it. As it melts, I start to wiggle my body. "I feel the magic!!! Do you feel it?! I'm ready to learn letters now!!!" The kids react the same way!  For the first 26 days of school, we practice making a new letter, we draw a picture of something that starts with that letter, and we color Clifford and friends! Each day, we look at our Chicka Chicka anchor chart to find the letter of the day. Once we find it, we add names of students who start with our special letter to our classroom word wall.  Learning names is a big deal for our little ones! At a young age, kids easily connect with concepts when it applies to themselves. At our house and in our classroom, we start with learning the first letters in names of people who are in our families and in our class. We practice comprehension skills and make connections to text by creating our personalized crafts! As always, there's just a few materials needed and a few steps to take to get started with our easy crafts for kids! PRINT!  Cut!  Glue!  We had some letter stickers at home that happened to work well with this craft, but your child could also write with markers. In the past, we have also used foam letter stickers. I cut the pieces out for this three-year-old, but using the glue stick takes coordination for him, and he's also practicing visual spatial skills.  I love the concentration and excitement you see here! Also, do you know how tricky it is for little ones to get stickers off of a page? This activity is PERFECT for fine motor practice! Can you tell that I've had some AMAZING occupational therapists in my life?! They have taught me so much, and I've been fortunate to have them all to myself (okay, and my students have been there, too) for weekly lessons!   Okay, so are you ready to get started with your name activity? Here's a link to get them engaged with the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBDTPHZO-xo If you have the book available, read it next. Read slowly, touching each letter and asking children to point to letters, too. I promise they'll be SO proud of what they know!  MEGA Name Craft Bundle for the Whole Year!So here's the thing... name crafts are NOT just for the beginning of the school year! We create name crafts all year long! What's fun is that you can easily differentiate name crafts to keep kiddos challenged. We start with first names, but as the year progresses, we do last names. Some friends even want to try middle names! At the beginning of the year, I write letters for most students, but they write letters themselves later on in the school year. There are just so many skills these activities offer! Let's keep these little ones excited about letters all year long!!!  And NOW...Your Free Name Craft Activity! Click the Picture! Chicka Chicka Boom Boom!If you'd be so kind to come back and drop us some feedback, we'd be SO thankful!! Enjoy! 
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