Children loves imitating adults. Here’s an invitation where they can pretend to cook a soup, an alphabet soup. Perfect for cold winter days! 🙂

Learning the alphabet can be fun. Sit down with the child and do a role play. Pretend to put the lower case letters in the frying pan, while the upper case letters goes in the pot. Asking other members of the family what letter they would like for their dinner is fun too! This activity is recommended for children 2 years and over

Note: You can tailor this activity for younger children by omitting the water beads or substituting it with tapioca balls.  In addition, you could also omit the pebbles.

When Alex saw this activity on the messy mat, he was eager to try it. It is open-ended which means it allows him to express himself in play freely and creatively, not bound by pre set limitations. It encourages imagination and foster concentration skills.

I deliberately added warm water inside for a different sensation. He loves the feel of warm water especially during cold weather. “It’s cooking, mummy! It’s getting hot!” as he pretends that the lid of the container to be the stove. Encourage them to count, classify and match lower case and upper case letters.

By around 18 months to 2 years of age, a child usually able to use one object to represent another object and engage in one / two simple actions of pretend play. “Would you like some dinner, mummy? Here’s your dinner, don’t forget to drink!” as he put a bowl of alphabet soup in front of me and pour some water onto the measuring jug . “Now, let’s eat, mum! Yummy!”.

Why use wall chart when you can have hands on learning? He was having so much fun recognising letters of the alphabet, practice phonics, and associate words that start with each letter.

Materials

• 10 gram packet of water beads, let it expand overnight
• Upper case Foam letters
• Lower case Foam letters
• Pebbles
• Container
• Pots
• Pans
• Soup Ladle
• Measuring cups
• 2 litres lukewarm water
• Measuring Jug
• Bowls

Instruction

1. Put some water beads, pebbles, upper case / lower case foam letters into a container.
2. Add some other props like soup ladle, pans, pots, bowls, measuring cups, etc next to it.
3. Lastly, pour some lukewarm water into the container. Make sure that you test the water temperature beforehand.