Mosaic letters is a fun and easy way for children to learn their letter names and sounds, or an equally great exercise that reinforces letter identification skills as well as fine motor skills. I love doing this artsy and crafty activity when teaching younger preschoolers about the letters in their own name. Mosaic letters is a wonderful and fun way reinforce name recognition skills.
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We began with strips of colored paper, no more than an inch wide.
For younger preschoolers who are not experienced in cutting, 1/2 inch wide is perfect. It allows the child to snip at the paper and cut all the way across it in the first attempt. This is important because it then frees up the student to think about proper hand positioning and such. For details on how to teach a youngster to scissor cut, see my post Tips For Teaching Scissor Cutting.
Invite your child to cut the strips of paper into smaller pieces.
Once the students have cut a nice pile of “mosaic tiles”, hand out the glue sticks and invite them to paste the tiles onto a letter you have already printed out. You can choose any letter, based on your overall goals. Maybe a focus letter you want to reinforce for letter identification practice, or the first letter of your child’s name.
Overall, this activity took about a half an hour, and frankly, required very little work from me. My main responsibility as the preschool teacher was to supervise and direct the youngest preschoolers (who have recently turned three) to use the scissors safely and appropriately. Gluing was the easy part, but both stages of the project was equally rewarding for the students.
Enjoy!
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I am Sarah, an educator turned stay-at-home mama of five! I am 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 range of levels, including preschool and college, and a little bit of just about 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
I love doing this with the first letter of the kids names because that is what we focus on at the beginning of the year. I have some young 3’s coming to preschool so I am a bit nervous about scissor time! 🙂 But thank you for reminding me about this activity–a great one that works on many skills!
You know, I did this activity with my summer preschool class which was mainly made up of 3 year olds. Because the strips of paper were so thin, it only took one snip to cut across the strip, making it more manageable for those little hands. The larger task was to make sure that each student was holding the scissors safely and properly. But…most of those 3 year olds hadn’t had any exposure to cutting before this activity, and they were so proud of themselves for being able to cut!