All day toddlers are looking, listening, playing and soaking up all the new sounds and sights around them. Learning letters can be fun and another exciting part of your toddler’s day.
Try these 10 genius alphabet activities for toddlers to teach those first letters. And have fun introducing your toddler to their A,B,Cs.
10 genius alphabet activities for toddlers
Paint water letters
Take a bucket of water and a giant paintbrush and head outside.
Help your toddler paint a nice easy letter on the path or on your fence.
They can practice making the shape and have a lot of fun slapping water around too.
Play dough letter moulding
Mould letters with play dough.
First roll ‘worms’ of play dough. Then help your toddler curve them into letter shapes.
You can find a full letter moulding game with free printables here.
Empty flour into a large oven tray or onto a flat surface. Ask your child to write out letters in the flour with their fingers.
They can copy the letter from a flashcard or you can help them.
This activity can get a little floury! But it’s all about trying and having fun at this stage with no pressure to get it perfectly right.
Letter games in the tub
If you have a couple of spare rubber ducks and a foam board, you can easily make this fun phonics game.
Match the letter on the duck to the letter on the foam board. It’s all waterproof and perfect for bathtimes.
Full ‘How to’ instructions are here: Rubber Duck Phonics Game.
Make magic letters
Magic letters is a lovely activity for older toddlers (2-3 years).
Write a single large letter, their name or a simple word in white crayon on a piece of white paper.
Give them a pot of watered down paints in different colours and a thick paintbrush. Let them paint the entire piece of paper until the letters magically appear through the colours.
As they appear your toddler can sound out each letter or even try blending a few together.
The full craft instructions are here: Magic Letter Activity.
Spell their name
The Ship Ahoy – spell your name game can be a fun way to learn letters, and is pictured here.
Your toddler chooses the correct lettered portholes to place on their ship so that they can build up their name.
Or you could try the Blossom name tree name craft. Here your child picks a lettered blossom. They place it on the branches of their ‘tree’ to spell out their name.
Play around with letter magnets
Letter magnets are so much fun and an easy alphabet toy to play around with.
Either let them line them up on a magnetic white board, or play around with them on the fridge. It all helps them become more familiar with the letter shapes.
Make glitter letter cards
Some glue and a whole lotta glitter can make letters sparkle and shine.
Try these fun glitter letter cards to jazz up those first abcs.
The full craft can be found here: Glitter letter activity for toddlers.
Salt writing tray
This Montessori writing tray can be made with salt or even sugar.
Lay it out and place a large letter in front of it. Let your toddler copy the lines of the letter by writing with their finger. If they make a mistake it’s no problem as they can just shake the tray and start again!
For the full learning activity see the Montessori Writing Tray here.
The more toddlers see and hear letter sounds from a young age, the more familiar they will become.
They can set your child onto the right path when it comes to learning their letters, sounds and words in years ahead.