What is the practice?

This practice involves the use of alphabet blocks that make noise when shaken or squeezed and other kinds of alphabet blocks that provide some kind of feedback when an infant plays with them. Playing with the blocks introduces a child to the ABCs.

Mother reading to child

What does the practice look like?

After an infant learns that she can shake rattles, swipe at mobiles, bang a toy on a highchair tray, and otherwise make something interesting and fun happen, many kinds of store-bought and homemade alphabet toys can be used by the child to make noises or produce interesting feedback. Search the Web using infant alphabet blocks to get some ideas about the variety of alphabet toys for infants. The secret is that the blocks need to provide the child some type of feedback when she plays with them. You can make alphabet toys using small plastic containers with each container having different things inside to make different sounds and each with a different letter of the alphabet printed on all six sides. Be sure the containers cannot be opened and the letters are written with markers with nontoxic, permanent ink.

How do you do the practice?

If your child likes banging, shaking, making noise, and seeing interesting things happen, she will easily figure out how to play with the ABC blocks and toys. Here are some ideas you can use to introduce letter recognition into your child’s block play.

How do you know the practice worked?

  • Does your child like using the blocks to make different sounds?
  • Does your child try to imitate or make sounds that are like the letters she hears you say?
  • Does your child try putting blocks together in some kind of order?
  • Pick a few words that your child is familiar with (such as her name, Mommy, Daddy, doggy, kitty, etc.). While your child is playing with the blocks, show her ones that start with familiar names and say, “Look! This block has a ___ on it. (Child’s name) starts with a ___.” Use similar kinds of descriptions to introduce the letters and their sounds into the block play.
  • Use simple word games or ABC songs while playing with the child (“A is for apple, B is for boy, C is for cat”). Use only as many letters and words that maintain your child’s attention. The next time you and your child play with the alphabet blocks, repeat the same letters and words. Hearing them over and over will help her with recognition.
  • Blocks that have pictures or images of your child’s favorite things that also have the first letter of the objects’ names will also help with letter recognition.

Take a look at more letterpalooza fun

Sound-Making Toys

Olivia, 10 months old, is a squeezer! Anything that is soft, squishy, and squeaky gets her excited and babbling. Olivia’s mom has found some soft ABC blocks that each have pictures of the first letter of different animal names. Mom introduces the blocks to Olivia as part of a give-and-take game they play with toys and other objects that Olivia has figured out how to “mash” to make sounds. When Mom shows her daughter the new toys, Olivia immediately gets interested in playing with them. As Mom introduces each of the blocks to Olivia, she names the animal on a block and says the first letter of the animal’s name (“This one has a bear. Bear starts with a B”).

Shake, Rattle, and Roll

Seven-month-old David and his big brother, Nathan, play a game of Shake, Rattle, and Roll, where each partner shakes a toy that produces a sound (rattles) while shaking their bodies back-in-forth. Nathan changes the game by adding a new phrase: “Shake, Rattle, and Roll! David puts the (letter name) block into the bowl!” Nathan hands a block to David and recites the rhyme each time David drops a letter block into a container. David starts asking for a block to continue the game by holding his hand out while trying to say something that sounds like block.

Braille Alphabet and Animal Sounds

Amanda’s mother has found a fun way to introduce the ABCs to her 15-month-old daughter who has a visual impairment. She uses a set of Braille alphabet blocks and incorporates them into an animal sound game that Amanda loves to play. Each of the blocks has a picture of an animal and the first letter of each animal’s name in Braille. Amanda reaches for the blocks, and each time she hands one to her mother, Mom makes the sound of the animal. Amanda loves to hear the sounds and delights in getting her mom to say the sounds.