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youtubeFriday, December 31st, 2004
Any suggestions on how to teach Alleke her colors, numbers, and alphabet?
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7 COMMENTS
You could play a game collecting things with the same colour. Naming the colour of things could be confusing: if you always point to a red ball saying ‘red’ Alleke might start to think ‘red’ means ‘ball’.
The alphabet song is a good idea, though at first it will just be a song, nothing more than that. Maybe you can get some of those plastic magnetic letters to stick on the fridge, to introduce her to the shapes. Reading books to Alleke helps a lot as she will learn that a text always stays the same no matter how many times you read it. I see a lot with the kids I babysit that after a while they know the book by heart and ‘read’ it to me (recite)! I guess what you want her to understand firstly is that something written (or drawn) can represent sounds (a word). Naming the pictures in a picture book also helps to make this clear. Then show her that A is her letter, M(ummy) and D(addy) etc.
Numbers you can practice by playing games, counting the animals in her bed before she goes to sleep for instance. Kids need to learn that when counting objects, one number goes with one object. Sometimes they will point at two objects for a number with two syllables. Show her how to point at or touch the items. Also lining up toys from big to small or the other way around is a good activity. Or sorting coloured shapes in different ways: by colour, by shape or by size. There are heaps of things to do! I wouldnt be to fussed about recognising written numbers for quite a while, as the insight in what they mean comes first.
Alleke is really young though, take it easy!
Love, Marlies
January 21, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Hi
I have 3 young sons the eldest has just turned 6. The single most useful toy EVER has to be stacking cups.
For colours, numbers and also concepts such as in and out, up and down, top and bottom, little and big, small and tall, We have a set of stacking cups (mine we bought from El Corte Ingles but you can get them anywhere) For those who don`t know they are a set of 10 plastic cups in different sizes and different colours, all the cups fit into each other and they can also stack up into a tower.
They are also great as they are virtually indestructable, they fit nicely into a bag, they can be used anywhere (indoors, outdoors, bath, swimmingpool etc) and they cost less than €15! (I think ikea even do them for €1 but they only have 3 colours)
Sebastian age six is now using them to help him with his maths (dividing 9 coins into 3 cups etc) and luca(4) and oliver(1) just love to stack`m´up and knock`m´down.
I think also it’s helpful to always talk to Alleke, always count everything out loud (stairs, biscuits, strokes of the hairbrush etc) and describe things (the blue baloon, the red plate, the grey pigeon) slight warning, This does turn you mad after a while, I find myself giving a running comentary on what I am doing even when there’s no one around!!
My last bit of advice is to forget the alphabet for the moment, it is too complicated for her to understand it being anything more than a song. OK it’s cute to hear a little sweety singing the ABC but not much educational use, especially as most teaching is now done using phonetics rather than the alphabet.
Anyway, I hope you find that useful?
Mum of 3, Marbella
January 22, 2008 at 10:29 am
The best way of teaching all of those is just to repeat a lot. When you’re reading a book, talk about the colors on each page. Ask her what color her clothes are and then what color your clothes are. Point out bright, vivid colors that stand out boldly from others. Ezra’s favorite color is red because that’s the first color he learned and it’s such a bold color.
Numbers just need lots of repetition too. Count everything! 
Count her fingers and toes, the number of people or animals or characters on each page when you’re reading, how many pieces of popcorn she’s eating… And then just count with her and have her repeat it. She’ll get it with lots of repetition just like how she learned to say everything she can say so far. And she’ll love all of that attention!
She sure looks like a sweet little girl!
January 25, 2008 at 3:56 am
I just talked to my son about everything that caught his eye and identify its color like “red mitten” or “blue sock”.
As far as numbers and alphabet, I made him his own “book” which I put in a photo album, and each page I had a letter on it and I cut things out of magazines for that letter like bugs and bears and balloons for the letter B. If a color fell on a certain page, I colored with a marker on that page too. I also put photos on it, especially for family that were out of town, and then he would crow “Auntie Michelle!” when we would come to the M’s.
With little ones, it is just repetition repetition repetition. Good luck!
January 26, 2008 at 3:43 am
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baby advice said...
The way that Alex learned was really just by coloring with him on a pretty regular basis. Another thing was singing the alphabet a lot (that is now one of his favorite songs!) One more is a puzzle, with numbers and letters.
I think that coloring would help the best, and then just write the numbers and letters and tell Alleke what you are writing and what color you are using.
January 20, 2008 at 8:57 pm