My two little learners have been utterly enchanted to be traveling along the Utterly Lovely Alphabet Path. They are greatly enjoying their letter studies and look forward to each day's activities. Kateri is forever asking questions like, What letter are we on? Are we still on D week? What letter comes next? Eliza is enamored with the alphabet and the beginning sounds of words and is forever singing her own ever-changing song, A is for apple, B is for bear, C is for kitty cat, D is for Dad... I decided it would be wise to capitalize on all of this Alphabet Enthusiasm and use the letter of the week as an opportunity to teach good habits and attitudes. I thought if I could come up with one word or phrase for each letter we could learn a lot over the course of the alphabet. I figured they would be captivated with anything Alphabet, and sure to remember it, and I was right.
We of course would need visuals to go along with the concepts, so I asked one of my trusty resident artists to help me out. Lydia has Graciously agreed to provide a coloring page for each of the letters of the alphabet, illustrating the habit or attitude or virtue we are trying to teach. She has completed the first six coloring pictures, and my very dear husband has formatted them very nicely for easy download and printing.
The little girls are delighted with the pages and excited to be learning new things, and they love to repeat them as I anticipated. Each week we will introduce a new concept, and keep reviewing the previous ones as well. We talk about the picture and discuss other examples of the idea portrayed.
So far we have: A is for Always Ask, showing a girl asking permission to have an apple, B is for Be a Blessing, showing a boy taking a cake to a neighbor, C is for Compassion, showing a girl offering a drink to her sick brother, D is for Do your Duty, showing a boy doing his sweeping chore, E is for Eat nicely, showing a girl at table, and F is for Friendly, showing a boy inviting another to come and play.
So far it is going very well with my little girls. Just tonight Kateri asked Josiah for a drink and as he poured it for her she said, You're being a good boy, Jo Jo, showing compassion. :-) I also thought of reading picture books that go along with each letter, such as Flower Garden
I would like to Be a Blessing and share these coloring pages with you. I would also like to express my Gratitude to Lydia, who has drawn some very sweet pictures, and to Michael, my dedicated Tech Support. We hope to have more letters up next week. Happy coloring!
