Animal Alphabet Book

The other day the kids and I were just playing around and reading books. I got the idea to have them write their own animal alphabet book. We have taken each letter and come up with an animal that begins with that letter. It has been so much fun. My kids look forward to doing a little bit each day.

My kids are at very different levels in their learning and I felt that this was a good activity that I could make meet both kids needs. My oldest (5) is reading very well. His job in this project is to think of the animal's that begin with that letter. This is an easy task for him because he has a firm grasp of beginning letter sounds.

My daughter is 3 and is just learning her letter names and sounds. This activity was mostly for her to help her learn the letter names and their sounds. It's my introductory activity to the alphabet. We are then going to take each letter week by week and do something with it to help her learn them. She has decided that she wants to learn how to read like her brother and my job as her mom is to help her reach her goals.

I made the books out of just white paper. I didn't want to use clipart pictures or typed up letters (partially because my printer is out of ink). Those things are cute, fun, and sure make the activity easier but they also limit the kids ability to create and think. We do 3-4 letters a day. I stop when my kids start getting bored or when they stop doing their best. Now my kids don't know what every animal looks like so we have been using the internet to look up the animals.

At first this task was overwhelming as they looked at the animals and tried to figure out how to draw these animals but we simplified them by looking for the shapes in the animals then just drawing those. It has worked very well and it's been a fun activity for us to do together. This is a great activity for Kindergarteners or Preschool aged kids or as a good review for first graders. They love to color and create and are so eager to learn.