I love reading other peoples blogs and finding new ideas to teach the alphabet, math, writing or actually everything, I am honestly addicted to so many blogs.   I love  A Teeny Tiny Teacher and  The Inspired Apple I could go on but these are some of my favs.  Anyway over the years I have changed and refined and lets face it still am, anyway I have gleaned a lot from so many and I thought I would share what I have found works for me... for now :-)

First lets get this out there as I know it is controversial BUT

1. I do a letter a day from Monday through Thursday 

I know there are differing ideas on this but after over 20 years of teaching, this is what really does work for me.  I will cycle through the alphabet probably twice depending on the class so all up that is 52 days or 13 weeks. Friday we revise all four letters we have looked at for the week.  NOW for those that are ready I will also introduce blends, word families etc. a lot of this is done during shared book time and if needed we will revisit letters that many have not yet mastered etc. 

I currently teach the alphabet in the McCracken order I started teaching in alphabetical order, then changed to by formation ie. l, i, t etc.  But I prefer the  McCracken order.

 The order is:

M, S, F, B 

T, C, A, R

 L, P, O, D 

G, N, W, I 

H, J, K, V 

U, Y, Qu, Z 

X, E

only short vowels to begin with.

I have a large teacher Alphabet Book which we write the letter of the day in and brainstorm things that begin with this letter and I attempt to draw them.

2.  Crafitivty or Activity 

The first cycle through as all my children are so very new and many - which always surprises me do not know their alphabet we do a craft or an activity.  This is done in conjunction with writing time or if it is teacher based just before.  I find Pinterest is great for finding new ideas but I do stick to many of my old favourites that I know work.  

Activities - For example if we were doing J we often make jelly so we make and then refrigerate a great opportunity to visit the staffroom.  I will model writing about and then hope others may do the same.  The same would apply to v -we will make a volcano, a trip to the sandpit add baking soda and vinegar and of course what a great writing topic.  

Craftivity - If we do a craft then I model before writing and then the class will rotate through this in their writing groups.  Thats where it is great to keep them simple so they can be completely independent here, I love a paper plate activity rainbows, octopus, cars, the sun you name it they are there.  

N for nest.

S for sun - a really simple activity draw a face, dab with yellow bingo dabber and glue on paper strips.  Too easy.

Crowns and Bracelets - Another fun little activity that I will often add to the mix.

Worksheet - Once a week it will probably just be a worksheet because by Thursday we are tired so often it is just my easy go to activity or we might only rotate through stations and spend more time on our alphabet book.   

Classroom Stations

At the same time as this the class are rotating through stations in the room - the writing table,  the stamping centre,  alphabet puzzles,  OHP,  the build it table, mobilo,  playdough, chalk writing outside, magnetic letters, write the room alphabet and any other activity I have set up like my alphabet cootie catchers - grab them for free or Alphabet Spin and Dab. I like to have quite a few stations so the children may only visit each station once or twice a week.

or Alphabet Spin and Color/Colour 

Singing and our Class Alphabet Book.

After morning tea we do our alphabet singing,  I have had these songs forever and I honestly do not know where they came from but the children have their own copies and they sit and read and sing and point at the same time.  This little group of songs also includes sight word songs, blends etc.  

We then quickly do our class alphabet book I have a large teacher copy where we write the letter of the day in and brainstorm things that begin with this letter and I attempt to draw them.

Handwriting.

We are then straight into handwriting which is always the same letter as our letter of the day.  I always only start with lower case letter handwriting I have made my own book (grab it HERE)  at the start we only do lower case handwriting after we have cycled through this then we will handwrite lower and upper case letters - I have also made a book for this.

Letterland  I also use the Letterland actions I find they just really help and once again, I have used them for years.

So in a nutshell we sing, we move, we write, we say, we order and we make the alphabet letters so hopefully we remember!

And that is my alphabet routine for the beginning of the year.