Letter Formation and Early Writing

Learning our Letters and How to Write Them

In learning to read and write there are many components and sometimes one of the hardest parts for us when we're first learning is actually the mechanics of writing.  We focus on looking at identifying letters, the sounds they make and the shapes used to make up those letters so that we can hear a sound, know the letter and know how to actually make that letter.  

We practise this every day using our ABC song and the matching card to help us remember the names of the letters and the sounds they make.

We also use the story Casey the Caterpillar to teach the language and shapes around letter formation

Here is an example of how the letter c is called an open mouth and how we build on that shape to teach other letter shapes.

This is the cheat sheet so that you can be using the same language at home:

And here are some examples of our practise:

We start with shapes and we connect them.  Here we were working on the cup shape.  Cup, short stick.  Cup, possum tail.  Cup, cup.

The shapes for these letters are short stick, tunnel stop.  Short stick, tunnel and short stick, tunnel, tunnel. We also connect these to the sounds that the letter makes.

Then we move on to using our knowledge to write words:

Then we move on to having a go at writing the words we know:

There are many elements to learning to write.  We are working so hard in Autahi to grow our brains and practise all of these parts!