Alphabet Water Play

Today I needed an activity that was easy to set up and that Monkey could play with independently. My poor little Peanut has been sick for a while now and I think he might be teething, too. 

I did a similar activity about six months ago, minus the water. So in the back of my head I knew that it would probably entertain Monkey again if I added water. 

Supplies: letters (we used foam and sponge), ladle, tongs, bucket, towel, food colouring (optional)

Monkey decided to use blue food colouring so he helped me drop it in and stir up the water in the bucket. 

If you use food colouring, I recommend only a drop or two - it can stain your hands even when it's diluted. Personally I'm not worried about that, I think if you can eat it then how could it be bad for your skin? Something to keep in mind, though. 

Next, we dumped in the letters and Monkey started to play. 

I decided to put in two sets of alphabet letters so that we could find matching pairs.

Monkey also practiced his letter sounds while grabbing the letters with the tongs. He does this on his own all the time, almost any time he sees the alphabet. 

Just as I'd hoped, he was able to play with this independently. When I had a chance I would come over and talk to him about the letters or ask what he was doing. We found a few letter pairs. That was tricky because the amount of letters meant that Monkey really needed to focus to discriminate and find the specific ones he was looking for. 

Mar