ABC Phonics Book

At the beginning of the year we were learning the ABC phonogram sounds. I used the flash cards created by Wanda Sanseri to keep me organized. I have discovered I tend towards curriculum materials that are basic and structural, so that I can remain on track whilst using my energies towards interesting flourishes. I use the basic materials like a map so I don't forget something along the way. As we are following the map we take side trails and mini vacations to do something interesting, then back to the map. I used the phonograms cards for drill mostly. Each morning I simply drilled them on about 6 letters. It took all of about 5-10 minutes. As they learned a letter I would drop it out and add another.  We did a variety of things pertaining to the letters we were drilling to re-inforce them and make them easy to remember. We did art work, handwriting, sort the pictures, musical phonograms, find the phonogram and the all time favorite..... flash light phonics. In this game I "hid" the phonogram cards in a dark room and then gave the boys flash lights. I would say one of the phonogram sounds, and they would hunt for it in the dark with their flash lights. Once they found it they would stand still shining their light on the correct card. Now that the year is ending we are putting all our work into "books."

They all made front covers that looked like this. Each picked their own font for the title and put the letter stickers on in their own way. This is T.J.'s cover.

The Letter "a" has actually three sounds but we did not include the "a" by itself.

This was a fun art project to do. We looked at hand drawn pictures of aliens, talked a little about what they were and then drew some of our own. This Alien was drawn by T.J.

This bee hive and bumble bees are images we found at Danielle's Place.

This bee hive picture was designed by Zak.

Here is an example of the handwriting sheets we were working on. We did one sheet for each letter. They are from ABC I Believe. Though the verses were good, we didn't really do much with them. This is T.J.'s handwriting page.

This is also something we did with each letter.We sorted the pictures by the first sounds. For letters like "b" which have only one sound I simply gave them pictures some of which began with "b" some which did not. Then they glued the pictures that began with "b" onto the "B" sheet. The pictures I found here.

For this page I pre-cut different sized circles and encouraged them to make designs with them. I encouraged them to overlap and leave some hanging off the page, to mix colors etc. This circle design was done by Max.

This was something the boys invented. I gave them a coloring sheet with this clown on it. They decided to turn the clown over and trace the image on the back. Turned out looking really great! This clown was drawn by Max.

Dinosaurs and dots! I pre-cut the dinosaur and they punched out dots using a hole punch and extra colored paper scraps. This dinosaur was done by Zak.

Hand writing page done by T.J.

By mixing white and black we made the perfect color for an elephant. Then the boys took turns dipping their hands into the grey paint to make this hand print dinosaur. I gave them "e" letters done in different fonts to decorate around the elephant. They cut out the light blue paper to make the ears. This one was made by Max.

Max did some free hand drawing of the letters. This is his "e" hand writing page.

Though you can't see it in this picture, under the egyptian coloring page I wrote the word Egypt in pencil and they traced it over with gold metallic pens. If there is any writing on any of these pages it was first printed by me in pencil and then they traced over it. We did a fun coloring race with this picture because the boys were getting a little bored with filling in pictures and I wanted to encourage them to use alot of color so I laid out all the pens and had them each pick one color. Then I timed them as they colored anything they wanted on the page for 30 sec. Then we changed pens and I timed them again etc. Max in particular loved this game. We did it many times more for other things. This picture was colored by T.J.

The flamingo I drew and they cut out. I provided them with pink foam sheets and they cut out extra feathers for the tail.  This flamingo was made by Max.

The giraffe (soft g) and the glasses (hard g) was created by tracing a drawing I made and they cut out glasses which can be found here. They added the grass in the mouth and did the coloring of the spots. This picture was done by Max.

Max and I designed this helicopter. He had the idea in his head and I helped him to draw it and cut out the parts. He also had the idea to trace the propellers and make it look like it was flying and to draw the man inside flying it.

The inch worm was found at Danielle's Place. But, you will have to have a membership to use it.

This was a fun project! I found this template for making your own jigsaw. I printed it out on card staock and the boys drew a picture on the blank side. Then I cut it out and we keep it in a ziplock bag attached to the page. This is T.J.'s puzzle picture.

Art Projects for kids has wonderful mural size paintings of famous artists for a mere $5. We used this painting by Kandinsky in a smaller format for our book, but some day soon we will do the wall sized mural. :) This is Zak's Kandinsky painting.

With many of the letters, not all, we used masking tape to make the letter forms and then either painted over the tape or colored with pens over the tape. Then very carefully we peeled off the tape and voila! a letter.

This "K" was done by Zak.

To make this lolly pop picture simply trace around jar lids of increasing size on colored paper. Then cut them out and create the lolly pop of you invision. The boys were not really into making swirls but it would be a nice effect. This lolly pop was made by Max.

A hand printed octopus, a paper moon, and an ocean putting all three sounds of "o" together into one page.
This "o" page was created by Zak.

This Picasso style portrait was inspired by Art Projects for kids. I drew an outline for them to begin with, then they took off with their own colors. Max added lines for design instead of filling in the spaces with one color. Sort of looks like a spaghetti Man. I love it!

Some of the letters with one sound we used these bowls for pockets.

The quilts were a lot of fun. I cut out the colorful shapes and they arranged them on the green square in a design. Then we added stitch marks. This quilt square was made by Max.

The race car was the page the boys liked best. Go figure. Each had a slightly different shaped car which I found here. They cut the car out and Max had the fun idea of adding the door. We glued down the letter "r" to define where the door would be then I cut it out with an exact-o knife. We pasted a piece of yellow paper on the back and the boys drew in the little people.

This is T.J.'s car.

Another letter page with the bowl.

S is for strawberries and storks! For this page we cut up our handwriting page for letter "s" and put the letters on the big S which is part of the ABC I Believe package.

S also says ZZZZ as in please.

T.J.'s turtle. I never did get around to making the quilt that this pattern comes from. It is adorable with turtles all around the edge. The pattern had alot of little pieces we omitted. They went a little wild with the free hand drawing.

T.J.'s handwriting sheet

Letter "U" has three sounds.

I did all the drawing and they put in the mosaic pieces.

The mosaic pieces were old watercolor drawings we had made experimenting with different colors of blue.

Max's handwriting sheet. We did alot of Valentines crafts this year but none made it into the book.

Max's watermelon for letter "W." "W's" for seeds.

Zak's "Xlaphone"

This Yak has a movable tongue! The "Y' sound on the bottom and the "I" sounds on the top

Last.....Max's pushmi-pullyu zebra. He had just read Doctor Dolittle when we did this page.

Many of the ideas for these ABC pages were inspired by the Crafty Crow. They also have some fun ideas for activities and snacks that go with the ABC letters.