Nature Letters

Incorporating nature into my preschool program is important to me, so I loved this Nature Letters idea for a table top literacy activity from Mother Goose Time.

I collected plants from our garden and yard for our nature letters activity including rosemary, mint, thyme, spirea, and mums.

The children could select plants they wanted to use to arrange and form their letters. My group is young so I used the alphabet cards from Mother Goose Time  as templates to create the letters.

Older children could make the letters freeform, on the table.

We took turns with the letter cards so they could try different letters.

Such a beautiful way to practice making letters!

Using fresh cut herbs and plants is also a sensory experience. This little guy said, “This smells good!” It’s rosemary and he’s right, it smells great!

I wasn’t really thinking that the kids would pull off leaves and arrange them to create letters so I was surprised to see this little creation. Great idea! Plus it involves fine motor skills and developing finger and hand strength so what’s not to like?

There have been times when I set up an invitation to learn and children are just not that into it but that was not the case with nature letters. They were very interested and spent 10-15 minutes on creating letters.

While our tabletop literacy activity was short-lived, you could also create a nature letter book by gluing down the sticks, leaves, pine needles, branches or acorns into a booklet.

All you need is a tray of plant stems and alphabet letters.

Nature letters is an example of hands-on learning at it’s best!

Take this wonderful activity outdoors too, if desired, as it can be al little messy.

Literacy, nature, fine motor development and sensory play all help children learn in an appealing and natural way, adding to their knowledge of the alphabet and world around them.

Have you ever seen such beautiful letter A’s? Love this idea for setting up a preschool literacy activity and allowing for independent exploration of natural materials and the alphabet.

Find out more about my favorite way to teach young children: