Space Exploration

Recently my son has started to ask “What does that say Mummy?” whilst walking past a road sign or when reading a book. So, I thought this would be a nice opportunity to start exploring the initial sounds in some words.

This is a creative and sensory phonics activity to begin to explore the sounds at the beginning of words. You can read more about phonics in this blog here.

This activity could easily be adapted for older children and when the time is right I will use it to teach my son number recognition.

Set Up

So I created the feely box from an old shoe box. I made two large holes in the top and covered it with a survival blanket that I had from when my son was a baby. I made the holes at the top of the box quite wide because my son is very tentative (I.E. sensible) when putting his hands into something he doesn’t know.

I filled the box with dried black beans, planets, stars and the letters from the Melissa and Doug puzzle and we were ready to go.

My two year was immediately drawn to this sensory phonics activity and his first question was “What’s in there?” He loved putting his hand in and exploring what was inside the box.

Each time my son pulled out a letter I would say the word placing a heavy emphasis on the initial letter sound. My son then would take the letter puzzle and place it on the picture on the puzzle.

This was a really fun, creative and sensory phonics activity that we will definitely be repeating.