A DIY Moveable Alphabet

When the girls are first learning something, I really like to separate out the various skills involved, especially with writing, which both girls, and Willow in particular, still often find challenging in regards to letter formation and positioning.

So although I want Sydney to be able to physically form words, because it helps her read and memorize them, I don't necessarily want her to have to write them--she'll be reading and memorizing with part of her brain, yes, but only the part that's not already focused on which way the "b" goes and which part of "p" sits on the line and how to make "a" so that I don't erase it and ask her to do it again.

Instead, when Syd has a new phonogram to learn, she "builds" her words using a DIY moveable alphabet that we put together. It's mostly made up of Scrabble tiles--

--but we've got some FIMO letters in the mix, and some letters punched out of cardstock and pressed in my pinback button machine, and some that the girls made by sticking alphabet stickers on 1" graph paper and then cutting it out.

I set the alphabet out for Sydney along with a stack of words that practice a particular phonogram, and she sprawls out on our (unvacuumed) carpet to build and read the words:

Handwriting is a separate subject, but one that we do every day, so don't worry--she still gets to write her words out!

The test of a successfully written exercise, for Sydney, is that the letters are all correctly formed AND she can read it to me, so I deviously sneak in a little more practice reading those brand-new phonograms there.