Teaching the Alphabet with Playdough

Preschoolers love to play with play dough. It’s fun, it’s squishy, and it’s an excellent manipulative to have on hand when teaching the alphabet.

Playdough offers a fun addition to your alphabet activities for preschoolers.

I love when I find fun, hands-on ways to teach basic preschool skills! Kids need exposure to a variety of activities the focus on those skills.

You can use worksheets, movement, song, and hands-on activities to expose kids to what you’re teaching them. 

Preschoolers love to play with play dough. It's fun, it's squishy, and it's an excellent manipulative to have on hand when teaching the alphabet.

The alphabet activities featured below will help kids with letter recognition and letter formation while building motor skills!

Teaching the Alphabet

Needed Supplies

Play dough

• Stick or knife

Magnetic Letters

Activity 1: Write the Alphabet

Have your children roll the playdough into long snakes. Longer and slimmer is better than short and fat. The long skinny snakes are easier to fold into letters.

Help your child to create the letters of the alphabet with their playdough. You can even write the entire alphabet together using playdough if your child’s attention will hold. Quite frankly, my kids tend to have shorter attention spans, so we only work on a letter or two at a time.

Another great option to writing the entire alphabet is to write short words or your child’s name. Nothing makes a preschooler happier than to see their name written before them in play dough.

Preschoolers love play dough. Here are three ways preschoolers can learn the alphabet with playdough!

Activity 2: Draw the Alphabet

Playdough can also be used to draw the alphabet on. First you roll the play dough as flat as you can. Kids love using rolling pins for this. The playdough needs to be smooth rather than thin, so don’t worry if there’s still quite a bit of depth when your child is finished.

Now take a stick or a pencil, and write a few letters into the playdough. Encourage your child to attempt to make the lines themselves. See how many letters you can write.

Cut your child’s name into the playdough, and encourage your child to trace their name with a finger. If you’re adventurous, your child can use pebbles or beans to trace the letters of their name.

Preschoolers love play dough. Here are three ways preschoolers can learn the alphabet with playdough!

Activity 3: Stamp the Alphabet

Stamping the alphabet is really fun and easy for preschool kids. I prefer to use magnetic letters since they’re stuck to the refrigerator.

Again you’ll want to let your child roll the playdough flat. Once your child is satisfied with the smoothness of the playdough, choose a few letters to stamp into the play dough. Be sure to name the letter as you push it  in. Encourage your child to trace the letter with a finger.

Have fun stamping names and easy words. Try dog, cat, or rat. Encourage your kids to draw a dog, cat, or rat into the play dough beneath the words.

Preschoolers love play dough. Here are three ways preschoolers can learn the alphabet with playdough!

Play dough is a fun and easy way to learn the alphabet with preschoolers.

Do your preschoolers learn the alphabet with play dough?

Alphabet Trace and Color Pages

As you begin to teach the alphabet to your preschoolers, be sure to add some fun worksheets to your activities. This set of alphabet trace and color pages is perfect for working on letter recognition and handwriting while providing a fun coloring activity, as well.

Click the image below, add your email address, and then check your inbox for your download link.

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Alphabet Books

Alphabet books are a great way to help preschoolers and kindergarteners learn their letters. And they don’t have to be boring, either!

There are all sorts of fun and engaging alphabet books out there, from books that teach the letters through rhyming verses to books that feature adorable animals.

Alphabet books can also be a great way for parents and caregivers to bond with their little ones. Reading together is always a special time, and it’s even more special when you’re sharing a book that’s helping your child learn something new.

So whether you’re looking for a gift for a preschooler in your life or you just want to add some new titles to your home library, be sure to check out some alphabet books for kids!

• ABC’s for Boys – This one of a kind, hand illustrated alphabet book combines letters with all of boys’ favorite things–airplanes, dump trucks, and more!

Alpha Oops! The Day Z Went First  – It’s chaos! It’s pandemonium! And it’s definitely not as easy as A-B-C! Here’s a snappy story about the comic confusion that comes when the letters of the alphabet, like a class of unruly children, step out of order and show that each one has a mind of its own.

• Pinkalicious ABC – A is for Apple. B is for Bubble Bath. C is for Cupcake. What could be better than learning your ABC’s with Pinkalicious in this pinkamazing board book?

Preschoolers love to play with play dough. It's fun, it's squishy, and it's an excellent manipulative to have on hand when teaching the alphabet.

Additional Teaching Resources

This wooden alphabet board is double-sided with upper and lowercase print letters. It’s great for ages 2 and up for letter identification and letter formation. This board can be used with the included walnut “pen” or traced by finger. Makes a wonderful handwriting tool for at home or in the classroom. 

These hand painted rainbow alphabet rocks can do all sorts of things! Add them to a sensory bin, use them for loose parts play, put them in a writing center in the classroom, and much more!

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