A Week

It’s afficially A week!  Let the alphabet adventure begin.

First, click here to download and print this letter A that you can display it all week on your fridge or cupboard or in your child’s room.

Then pick and choose which A activities will work for you and your child.  Do as much or as little as you want. Anticipate each week being different. (X just can’t compete with A, B, or P.  Welcome to life, letters.)

CRAFT:

We started out with an awesome A craft.  Grandma Pam helped Croft make an apron for A week.  First, they went shopping together for fabric.  Croft was very decisive and opinionated on what she wanted.

Then they Grandma Pam sewed the apron with a foot petal push from Croft here and there.  Here is the adorable finished product: (I have a feeling this will not be the last silly face you will see over the course of this letter year.)

I adore this craft project for A week because she will get to wear the apron the rest of the year as we bake things together for all the other letters.  If you don’t sew or have someone you can mooch off like me, you can always buy an apron at a craft store and decorate it for the craft.

She also made this apple art print at preschool.  It looks like they just cut apples in half and dipped them in paint.

Here is an alligator craft that you could do.  Click here for complete instructions:

ACTIVITY:

We headed off to the aquarium with Aunt Austi.  (I am trying to include as much family and friends as well in our adventures.)

Other A activities: arcade, airport, aerobics, Air Science and Space Museum, archery, amusement park, art…

FOOD:

Since Croft has Stenson DNA inside her she is bound to love avocados so I didn’t worry about having her try those this week.

Instead I made asparagus one night and we did an apple taste test. We bought 5 different kinds of apples and then we ate them all.  We even had a couple of neighbor friends cast their vote.

We charted the results and Pink Ladies won by a landslide.  (They really are the best apples.)

Almonds seem to be the big health thing right now and I wanted to try a few recipes (this isn’t all about her you know:)  These chocolate covered almonds are on the docket for today:

For additional healthy A food ideas and recipes click here.

LEARNING:

Croft is going to preschool this year so I am letting her do most of her letter practice at preschool.  Unless someone knows of a great website where I can print alphabet worksheets???

But we did go on a letter walk around the house.  First, I typed up a paper with 15 lower case a’s on it.  (Kids have a harder time with lower case recognition so we are focusing on that.)  I prefer Century Gothic font because all the letters are formed like they learn in preschool.  Then Croft cut out all the a’s. This was a tedious task, but cutting with scissors is a great fine motor skill to practice.

We walked around the house and labeled a few items we saw that started with the letter A.  (Yes, I had to prompt and help.  Like, “Does d-d-d door start with the letter a?”  or “I see something in the pantry that starts with the letter A.” or “Do you know another name for car?”) I anticipate her improving with this skill as the year goes on. Some of our finds were attic, applesauce, almonds,  answering machine, air vent, arm, automobile and alarm clock.

Our A week was awesome.  In fact,  if I had to give it a grade I would give it an A!