Give the children plenty of opportunities to do letter sorts. Pass out word cards which have the targeted letter on them. Ask the children to come up and display their answers to questions about the letter. As an example, consider the letter “R.”
• R as the first letter—rose, rise, ran,
• R as the last letter—car, star, far,
• R with a t after it—start, heart, part, smart
• Two Rs in the middle of a word—carry, sorry, starry
Play "What's in a Name?" Select a student's name. As an example, consider "William." Copy the name down on a sentence strip. Have the children count the number of letters in the name and how many of them appear twice. Allow them to talk about which letter is upper case and which letters are lower case. Have the students chant the name. Then rewrite the name on another sentence strip. Have the strip cut into separate letters and see if someone from the class can put the name back together correctly.
As you read a book with or to the children, ask them to show you specific letters or lower case or upper case letters. Read the text first and encourage as many children as possible to come up and identify the letters. Use a big book and have felt letters available for display as well. If grade-, age-, and developmentally appropriate,
have the children write the letter they identified themselves. (Or, for even more fun, construct the letter using pipe cleaners, craft sticks, or colored markers, using different colors for upper and lower case letters.)
Play “letter leap” with the children and have them look carefully at the room to identify labeled items that begin with a specific letter by “leaping” over to them and placing a large lettered placard next to them. Children who have advanced in letter formation can then be challenged to “leap” through the classroom when called upon to literally “letter” unlabeled objects.
Read More : Strategies for Promoting Letter Knowledge and Letter Formation
