Nanny Alex is an experienced and qualified nanny who loves creating new and exciting ways for the children she works with to learn and grow.  She shares with us three wonderful games to help inspire learning through play – the subject of letters!

Fun can be had through play games, encouraging children to learn with laugher! Enjoy!

This week we visited Letter Land, the twins I care for are at the age where they soak everything up like a sponge and really enjoy learning! Most children begin recognising some letters between the ages of 2 and 3 and can identify most letters between 4 and 5.

This means that you can start teaching your child the alphabet when he’s around 2 — but don’t expect full mastery for some time.

Drawing Letters

Drawing letters is a great way to learn your letters, but sometimes the good old paper and pencil doesn’t cut it!

The twins I look after absolutely loved feeling the softness of the flour and copying the letters in front of them, it’s such a simple activity you can do at home.

This can also count as a sensory activity – A sensory activity is anything that involves the 5 senses (taste, touch, smell, hearing, sight) and also the vestibular or proprioception systems (see what are the 8 senses for more info).

Sensory activities for children can be messy, engaging, fun, and easy to put together

 

 

Park your letters in the right parking space.

Again another great game that the twins loved! I borrowed a few of their brothers cars and stuck on the letters with paper and tape. Cost effective and you can do this with colours and numbers as well.

Who said learning isn’t fun!

Letter Blocks!

Who doesn’t love building towers!

This way the children can learn the upper and lower case letters and start putting them in order or spell their names.

I know I always talk about ‘Learning through play’ and sometimes I don’t explain it, so here is a little explanation for you – Learning through play is a term used in education and psychology to describe how a child can learn to make sense of the world around them. Through play children can develop social and cognitive skills, mature emotionally, and gain the self-confidence required to engage in new experiences and environments. (google definition)

 

We’d love to hear how you get on with your own ‘learning through play’ tasks!

You can follow Nanny Alex on Instagram here.

Lots of love & penguins! Nanny Alex