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January 19, 2015 | 5 Comments

Easy Gem Letters – Alphabet Activities

alphabet activitiesPlaying and creating with letters has been a fun way for my children and students over the years to get comfortable with letters, learn their shapes, and spark discussion about letters as we craft. As children color, paint, glue, and handle letters while doing alphabet activities like this one they are learning. You can do this letter with upper or lowercase letters. I chose uppercase for my daughter because she is very comfortable and familiar with recognizing both and my goal for her is to get comfy with the shapes of the letters for writing. The handwriting program she uses at preschool and will be using in kindergarten next year focuses on uppercase first so we are focusing more on uppercase at this stage, though by no means ignoring the lowercase letters.

Adding jewels, buttons, stickers… is a novel way of personalizing this activity. My daughter adores these gems which made this activity a shoe-in from the start. You don’t have to make a name sign but as we make the letters she wanted to make something and I suggested a name sign for a bedroom. She loved that idea.

Gather your materials. You will need some acrylic gems, sticky back foam, permanent double stick tape, scissors, and multiple sheets of card stock if you want to make a sign. alphabet actvity

Start by writing the outlines to the letters on the back of the foam. Don’t forget to make them backward so when you cut them out they are correct. jeweld alphabet

Cut out. alphabet activity

Add the double stick tape. jeweled letters gemsI find this is way better on foam than glue. Once it’s down if you give it time to sit it will stay on forever. We did this craft before Christmas (all those Christmas crafts pushed this one to drafts) and not a single gem has fallen off. This is VERY tricky. She did the straight letters and the curves ones I took care of. alphabet activity

Add the gems. This is where the literacy activity can easily morph into counting, patterns, shape recognition, even estimation. How many gems do you think will fit on this letter? Take cues for your kids to decide how much to push just make sure it doesn’t feel like pushing. gem lettersI had put them into pretty little containers to make it easier for her to grab them, but there was no point as she just dumped them on the table to get a better view.  This took a lot of patience and if your child is struggling let the tape settle and really adhere to the foam first before adding the gems. alphabet activity

Let them sit for a while. We used them to spell all sorts of things before settling on her name.

alphabet activity

Arrange them in whatever display you want. I layered a few sheets of cardstock with double stick tape to make the base of the sign.  You could do the same or get a cheap canvas and add them to that. callie gem letters

Peel the back of the foam off and stick onto the card stock. gem letters alphabet

Find the perfect place for it and hang it up. Like I said we made this before Christmas and since we hung it up she traces it every night before we turn the light off. It’s a sweet reminder of how proud she is of making it as well as just a good literacy activity. alphabet activity

What alphabet activities do your kids enjoy? Share them in the comments below or on my Facebook page!

If you teach preschool or preschool at home, you will love my Little School eBook of preschool activities.

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Filed Under: Age Preschool, Age: Kindergarten, Alphabet activities, Fine Motor Activities, Letter Recognition, Letters & Numbers | 5 Comments

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5 Comments

  1. Kristina says

    March 5, 2015 at 9:42 am

    Love it. I am going to try it this weekend. Did you get the sticky foam at Michaels?

    to Kristina" aria-label='reply to this comment to Kristina'>reply to this comment
    • Allison McDonald says

      March 5, 2015 at 2:30 pm

      You can or Target, Walmart… some dollar stores!

      to Allison McDonald" aria-label='reply to this comment to Allison McDonald'>reply to this comment
  2. Nina says

    May 29, 2018 at 5:45 pm

    Where did you buy the gems?

    to Nina" aria-label='reply to this comment to Nina'>reply to this comment
    • Allison McDonald says

      May 31, 2018 at 12:53 pm

      Walmart!

      to Allison McDonald" aria-label='reply to this comment to Allison McDonald'>reply to this comment

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