Letter Dd Theme: Dandelions and Daisies

A few days ago I gave my little one a kind of assessment to see which letters she needs to spend more time on.  One of those letters was Dd.  Therefore, this was the focus of today’s theme.  

• We made a daisy crown using instructions from the DLTK website. Basically start by printing the template of daisies. Next, cut 3 long pieces from construction paper. Staple these together. This is your crown band. Color the daisies. Glue onto the headband.

• We made the letter Dd mini book: http://www.dltk-teach.com/minibooks/d/index.htm
• We decorated our big D with small wooden figures that start with the letter D.

• They aren’t too neatly cut but I did make her D and d sandpaper letters.  I traced a capital and lowercase d onto the back of sandpaper. I cut the letters out and glued them to foam which had been glued to cardboard.

  

• Next, we made playdoh D’s.

 

• We practiced tracing the letter D in moon sand and sugar.  Okay, well at least it was my idea for her to trace the letter.  I’ve tried this a few times and she never does trace the letter.  However, she did spend close to an hour just playing in the sugar.  I’m not sure how to get her to trace the letters, except to just keep introducing it to her periodically.

• Next we made daisies, using our hands.  Paint your child’s fingers with white paint. Make a print on the paper of your child’s fingers. Do this until you have a circle of white finger prints. Paint the palm of your child’s hand yellow along with the white fingers. Place the last print down and you will have a daisy.

• I found a few alphabet computer games for download that I’m going to start using at times: http://kidgen.net/downloads/index.htm, http://www.yourchildlearns.com/dirll.htm,http://www.yourchildlearns.com/letters/letter-sounds.htm
• We made dandelion seed/flower art. 
• Have your child paint glue onto a piece of paper... then have the child blow the seeds from a dandelion onto the paper. Then, find yellow dandelions and allow your child to dip in paint and then make a print on the paper.

• As far as phonics, I made a little song out of this-
• D says /d/ like dinosaur.
  D says /d/ /d/ /d/.
• Finally, I read a poem to Zhana that I have absolutely fell in love with.  I also based the drawing on one that I found online. I’m not an artist, lol, but my little tot still likes it.   Click here to be taken to the Our Little Nest Blog where you will see a much cuter blackboard drawing. Here is the poem-

O DANDELION

O Dandelion, yellow as gold, what do you do all day?
“I just wait here in the tall, green grass, ’till the children come to play.”

O Dandelion, yellow as gold, what do you do all night?
“I wait and wait, while the cool dew falls, and my hair grows long and white.”

And what do you do when your hair grows white, and the children come to play?
“They take me in their dimpled hands, and blow my hair away!”

She seems to really understand the letter D and hasn’t confused it with B at all today.  I’m really proud of a little conservation we had this morning.  I was asking her-

“Does DOLL start with D, like duh?”

“Yes, mom-mom” (Have I ever mentioned my dd calls me mom-mom?)

“Does DOG start with D, like duh?”

“Yes, D.”

“Does COW start with D, like duh?”

“No. Cow goes Cuh”. Not D.”

Wow, wow! What a proud mommy moment.  I’ve worked on letter recognition but not so much letter sounds so I’m so happy!