Homemade Puzzles - Beginning Letter Sounds/Word Families

These puzzles are so easy and so simple to make.  You basically just need some thick card stock and some peel and stick foam rubber sheets.

First, print the picture you want to make into a puzzle on the card stock. If you want to use mine click here for the file.  The words I used were: pig, wig, big, dig, pin, in.  We are using readingbear.org to learn phonics so these words are from the first "short i" presentation. (I highly recommend this free program especially if your child is little like mine.)

Then peel off the back of the foam sheet...

...and stick the card stock with your picture on to the foam.

Cut out your puzzle pieces with an xacto knife or razor blade.

And voila!  If you want something more durable you could print your picture on sticker paper and then stick your paper on card board.  For me, the foam sheets are great because they are so easy to slice but it still feels somewhat durable.

Animals in Spanish! Animated Flash Cards

For my second blog post ever ;) I thought I would share a little Flash application I made to teach the names of the animals in Spanish.  (Sorry, you probably can't view it on ipad, although you could try using the "Rover" ap.  Let me know if it works!)  It includes the written word highlighted while spoken to help familiarize the learner with how Spanish is written.  Let me know what you think!

I now have a printable version of these flashcards here.  Some new animals have been added. 

Word Family Flower Craft

Word Family Flower

 Word Family Flower Template

In my very first blog post ever I'd like to share a craft my little man and I did to help him learn word families.  Click the link above for the template if you'd like to try to make your own.

 

 I used paper plates and a thick glitter card stock for the flowers.  Toddler hands are going to be handling this so it needed to be something sturdy.  I traced the flowers from the template and cut them out.

The big flower will spin so it needs just one hole in the center.  The bigger the hole in the center, the easier it will spin.  The little flower needs two holes and a window.

I made two holes in the card stock I will be mounting my flower on.  Then I cut strips of a paper plate and wove it through one hole.

Next the strip goes through the center of the large flower...

Now it goes up through one hole of the little flower and back down through the other hole.

 Weave it back through the hole of the large flower and through the empty hole that was left in the card stock.

Here you can see it going through each piece.  (On this one I used pipe cleaner instead of the strip of paper plate, but the pipe cleaner made it harder to glue the word ending on.)

Finally, tape down the strip on the back of the card stock.  Make sure it's not too tight or the flower won't spin.

Write down the beginning letters when the flowers are together to make sure they are visible through the window.  We did "ap" words (map, cap, nap, lap, tap), so through the window I wrote the letters m, c, n, l, and t.  On the circle write the word endings (in our case "ap") and glue it in the center of the flower. 

At last, we glued on some leaves and added some paint to the back ground.  Now to make the rest of the garden!!!

I hope you enjoyed my first blog post!  Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!