Does your summer preschool theme include learning about the beach? These free beach theme printable prewriting cards are the perfect addition to your summer themes, especially your ocean theme. Your preschoolers will love these beachy prewriting mats. These will make prewriting skills practice feel like a day at the beach!
This post contains a free printable, so be sure to grab it from the end of the post.
Free Prewriting Cards and Other Preschool Beach Theme Printables
Whether you’re vacationing at the ocean or visiting the family lake house, preschoolers love, and get a lot out of, a preschool beach theme. It pairs nicely with most summer themes, especially ocean theme, but can also stand on it’s own.
One year, when my oldest son was turning five, he requested a family camping trip instead of a birthday party. He wanted his cousins to join him so we invited my brothers and my dad. We reserved campgrounds right next to each other, shared our meals, and enjoyed a green cake with no ice cream.
My son had a ball palling around with his cousins all weekend long. The weather was everything you could ask for in a summer camping trip. Warm during the day but cool at night.
One of those days we spend on the lake beach. We’d packed up a picnic lunch, including three watermelons, some fishing gear and life vests in our boat and cruised across the lake to a remote, sandy, white beach. There was some driftwood that was washed ashore and the kids climbed through and over it, but mostly we played on the beach all day. And ate watermelon. Although some of the kids mostly dropped their watermelon in the sand.
Donned in bathing suits and life vests, the cousins all played together while the adults lounged and read books. My son and his cousins built sand castles and dug moats. They waded in the lake and splashed one another. Then came back for more watermelon. Rinse and repeat. All day long.
This day is one of my favorite memories.
But my point in telling you all this is that children don’t need to have access to an ocean to have a connection to fun at the beach. Lakes have beaches, as do rivers. These pre-writing cards have all the iconic images of beach fun. And when I pulled them out for my little boys they immediately began reminiscing about all their lakefront beach experiences, which far outweigh their experiences with the ocean.
Free Preschool Beach Theme Printable for Prewriting Skills
What I love most about these prewriting cards is that you can use them in so many ways. As per the norm, I’ll share with you one way to use the printable, then list other ideas below.
And, of course, don’t forget to grab your free beach theme printables from the end of this post.
Materials
- free beach theme prewriting cards (found at the end of this post)
- dry erase pocket
- dry erase markers
- small beach themed manipulatives (ideas below, following the activity)
The Set Up
Print out the free prewriting cards in color on heavy cardstock. I have a basic Epson Workforce printer, which despite how inexpensive it was has lasted a number of years and continues to go strong.
Cut apart the cards.
From here you can choose to laminate or place the cards in a dry erase pocket. I prefer the dry erase pockets because the marker comes off easier than laminating. Plus, if a preschooler forgets to erase their card the marker doesn’t become permanent.
Place the cards and marker on a tray and invite your preschooler to practice drawing lines with you.
How to use this free preschool beach theme printable in your writing lesson plans
Using these prewriting cards as a tracing exercise is the most common way to use these cards. Using them as tracing cards is definitely the easiest way to add them to your preschool writing center.
Your preschooler may not use a mature pencil grasp when using a dry erase marker, and that is ok. When I teach writing to my preschoolers, I allow them to hold the pencil any way they choose. Often they will begin with what is most comfortable for them and then naturally progress and transition to a mature quadrupod or tripod pencil grasp.
If I have a preschooler who is just about at a mature pencil grasp, but not quite, I will offer pencil grips like these claw grips. I like these pencil grips better than others because they really help preschooler understand where to place their fingers on the pencil for the most control. However, if a child doesn’t like them, they are not forces to use them. But in my experience these claw grips can really help boost a preschooler into the tripod grasp we are looking for.
When teaching writing I emphasize that writing starts on the left side of our papers and goes to the right. That’s why my prewriting cards always have the pictures on the left side of the card. I tell my preschoolers to “start at the picture and draw on the lines.”
4 More Ways to Use These Beach Prewriting Cards
Tracing the lines is one route, but what if you have a preschooler who isn’t interested or isn’t ready for tracing? Try of of these fun ways to practice prewriting skills while using the same printable.
And don’t forget to grab your free copy of these beach prewriting cards at the end of the post.
- In keeping with the beach theme, work that tripod grasp by offering tiny seashells to place along the lines. These are our favorite mini seashells. But have you ever seen these teeny tiny starfish!?!
- If you don’t have seashells, then use any math manipulative. These fish counters are a good option for toddlers and young preschoolers. We used transparent math counters because my kids threw all our seashells in the sandbox!
- Squeezing glue is a great hand strengthening activity, so invite your preschoolers to trace the lines with glue, and then sprinkle sand over the top. Then, you end up with tactile tracing cards! And you can have fun with different sand colors, too.
- Or use these cards in a salt tray.
Grab your Beach Themed Prewriting Cards Here
Want these free beach themed printables prewriting cards? You can get your own by clicking the image below.
But then keep scrolling for a few more beach activities by some of my favorite bloggers!
More Beach Themed Printables
Check out these other fun beach themed ideas.
FROM LEFT TO RIGHT:
Beach Printable Pre-writing Cards
Roll a Beach Ball Playdough Mat
I’m Sarah, an educator turned stay-at-home-mama of five! I’m the owner and creator of Stay At Home Educator, a website about intentional teaching and purposeful learning in the early childhood years. I’ve taught a range of levels, from preschool to college and a little bit of everything in between. Right now my focus is teaching my children and running a preschool from my home. Credentials include: Bachelors in Art, Masters in Curriculum and Instruction.
Thank you for these prewriting pages. I work with Special Ed children and always need new pages to keep them interested!