Here’s a twist on an age old game to teach your child to recognize the starting sounds of a word.

1. Take a cloth bag, and attach a letter tag to it. Stick to letters that have consistent sounds like “b” or “f” to keep things simple.
2. Ask your child to find 5 things around the house that begin with that letter. You can progress to tougher letters as you go along.
3. Later, you can introduce her to combinations of letters like “sh.”

Enjoy!

Just in case it wasn’t obvious by now, I am a huge fan of using simple day to day activities and situations as opportunities to teach. There are countless activities in your day like cooking activities for preschoolers that you can use to create an enriching learning environment for your child.

I am one of those people who finds doing laundry very therapeutic. There’s something about dirty clothes going into the washer, and fresh clean clothes coming out that gives my mind a well deserved rest, and makes me fresh enough for new challenges. Some people meditate, others do yoga. I do laundry.

Whether you like doing laundry or not, here’s a sorting activity for your preschooler that you can use next laundry day. If she enjoys it, you could also add it to your list of chores for her to do. (You are giving her at least some chores, aren’t you?)

• Ask your child to help by sorting the dirty laundry into whites and coloreds, and then coloreds into wools, cottons and other fabrics.
• Once you’ve brought back the clean wash into the house, let her help you separate it into clothes and other things.
• Next up, ask her to separate clothes that belong to each family member.

What does she learn?

• Sorting according to fabric, and types of clothing
• Participating in a family activity (sense of accomplishment)
• A sense of neatness. (Hopefully, by the time she’s a teenager, she’ll have learned to actually fold her clothes and put them away, instead of cramming them all into the closet, and pushing against the door to lock it!)

Have fun!