A is for Apples!

We kicked off our study of the alphabet with the letter. Although, we do not talk about the letters in order we like to start out with A and end with Z. This summer I found some wonderful resources online through pinterest and have been incorporating many new ideas into our classroom. We have taken inspiration from Montessori style practical life shelves and add what we call activity bins to our classroom and daily routine.


 We rotate these bins weekly to keep the activities fresh. The students have really been enjoying this fun new way to work on fine motor, math and literacy skills and build independence.

During A week we sorted acorns by size

Used tongs to put apples in a muffin tin. The tonging developed fine motor skills while putting one apple in each spot helped us practice one-to-one correspondence.

We used alligator shaped tongs to hone our fine motor skill farther by putting pom pons in a tray.

We used a template I found on childcareland.com  laminated and taped to a cookie sheet as a magnet board. For each new letter students attach magnets to the dots practicing one-to-one correspondence and letter recognition. They have even started playing a game with this bin in pairs where they split the magnets and take turns putting them on.

I have been really pleased by the hard work we are seeing during activity bin time. What a great way to make learning experiences feel like games.