I’ve read aloud to Miss Molly since I was pregnant. During her first year I always had books with us in restaurants, family parties, etc. I was beyond excited when she first started singing the ABCs and asking me to read to her.

We are now in the toddler literacy phase, which is very different from baby literacy. The Reading Specialist in me is on high alert with how Molly is progressing learning her letters, sounds, rhyming, etc. I am beyond grateful that her school has a truly amazing curriculum (they even use Project Read).

However, she doesn’t let me finish reading a book to her anymore. When I do get her to read with me, I do a lot of interacting with her. I’ll ask for her to point to a letter, answer questions about pictures, etc. But sometimes I do worry that I’m not doing enough, and realized that I need to do more than just read aloud.

Puzzles

Molly has a few puzzles that she really enjoys playing with, but I wanted her to practice recognizing letters and order of the alphabet, so I purchased this letter puzzle from Six Corners Educational Toys. Not only do I love the pop of colors, the puzzle is super lightweight and the pieces fit in very snuggly (no lose pieces!).

But, my favorite aspect of this puzzle are the easy drawing instructions for each letter. There are numbers and lines for kids to trace with their fingers while they put pieces in the correct slots.

I was really surprised with this feature and showed Molly how to do it. She immediately proceeded to sing and attempted to trace letters.

Magnet Drawing Board

Last year my best friend’s mom gave Molly the Vtech Write & Learn Creative Center. She has loved this toy from the beginning, and has started to interact with it differently as she’s gotten older. She started with the magnets, then began drawing shapes, and now writing letters on the magnetic drawing board. This weekend she even told me she was going to practice writing her sight words and did for several minutes.

There are a bunch of different activities for kids to do with the buttons, but Molly prefers just to draw and erase her work so she can be independent. I do plan on exploring the buttons when Molly is a little older to really see what this center can do.

Magnetic Letters

As soon as Molly was able to walk, my mom bought her magnetic letters for the fridge. Molly has always loved playing with the magnets when she visits my parents and seems to make a game out of it every time.

A few weeks ago, Molly went to a children’s play place where they had a pretend school room. She made a beeline for the magnet letters and actually had to be pulled away from the easel at one point.

I recently purchased this really awesome magnetic letter set from Amazon (click here). It comes with a great magnetic board and an incredibly organized case of letters. Molly found the box and emptied it before I was ready to introduce the new “toy” to her, so I unfortunately did not get a chance to take any pictures.

I’m always on the hunt for new ways to support Molly’s early literacy skills at home. Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest are amazing resources to see what other parents and early childhood educators do to help toddlers with these skills.