9 Alphabet Games to Play With DIY Alphabet Stones

Why Play Reading Games?

As with every area of child development, some children will learn to read earlier, with seemingly less effort than others. Most of our children, with our support, will get there – in their own time. However, one mistake I have adult make is jumping too quickly into relying solely upon paper-based literacy activities for teaching early literacy skills. Expecting your child to sit passively and recite letter names or sight words by rote makes literacy learning with young children a whole lot more difficult than it needs to be.

In my experience, young children respond much more positively to fun, engaging, hands on activities that involve them in doing, problem solving, moving or exploring, instead of learning passively. And this goes for learning about letters, or sight word, or anything really.

How to Make Alphabet Stones

You will need:

• Small, smooth rocks, stones or pebbles (light coloured stones are best)
• Permanent marker pens or paint markers
• Mod Podge sealant, or varnish spray
• A small carry bag

To make:

These are super quick and easy to make. Simply write each letter of the alphabet on a stone with a permanent marker and then seal it with mod podge or spray varnish. Leave them overnight to harden and dry.

Be aware that although the varnish will help seal and protect the letters from rubbing off, it doesn’t make them waterproof or scratch proof.

Depending upon which activities you will use your stones for, you might like to make some extra vowel stones and those for common letters, or duplicates if your child has multiples of the same letter in their own name. You might also like to make both an upper- and a lowercase set.

1. Find Your Name: Starting with personally significant letters makes the learning experience more meaningful for your child. Hide the letters of your child’s name around the garden and ask them to head off on a hunt to find them. Once they have found them all, invite your child to help you lay them out in order and then sing the letters and their name to a little tune.

Once they have mastered the identity and order of their own name alphabet stones, you can also add some other personally significant letters, for example, /d/ for Dad, /m/ for Mum or /n/ for Nan.

2. Letter Hunt: Hide the alphabet stones around the garden. Give your child a small carry bag and set them off on a mission to find the letters. When they find a letter, ask what the letter is, or say the letter name to them. You might say, “You’ve found the letter s, it likes to make a sss sound in words.”

In What Order Should I Introduce the Letters of the Alphabet?

Depending on your child’s age, ability and interest you might start with just a small collection of letters. Many teachers start off with the letters S A T P I N as from these six letters (or rather, the sounds they make) you can form many first ‘sound out’ words – such as it, in, at. As your child masters this smaller collection of letters, add two or three more at a time to extend the learning experience. You might continue to add your letters in this order – M D G O C K E R U B H F L J W V X Y Z Q.

3. Order the Alphabet Stones: Once your child is up to finding all 26 stones you can work together to place them in alphabetical order. It may be beneficial to have them look at the letter, listen to you say the letter name and them ask them to repeat the letter back to you, to engage visual, auditory and verbal learning. Sing the alphabet song together as a reward for putting your stones in order.

5. Letter Jump: Create a path of letter stones along the grass or paving, each placed a small step apart. Invite your child to jump from letter to letter, saying each letter name (or letter sound) aloud as they jump over it. You can try all different sorts of jumps too. Start with two footed kangaroo jumps, then move onto squatting frog jumps or try one-footed hops. For children who are learning to read sight words, arrange letters as individual words to read aloud as they are jumped over.

6. Match Lower to Upper Case Letters: Using two sets of letter stones, one with upper case and one with lower case letters, use the letters in a matching game. Ask your child to find the lowercase t and match it to the uppercase T. Again, start with a smaller collection of matching letters and add to them over time.

8. Sight Word Hunt: Hide the letters around your garden again but this time arrange them as individual words (example shown below). Invite your child to find and read each word. Once all of the words have been found, have your child stand in the middle of your outdoor space. Call out a word and have them race to where that word was hidden and say it aloud.

More Alphabet Games & Activities to Explore;