Alphabet Stress: Don’t worry about teaching the alphabet to your pre-schooler!!! I heard a mother say that she was stressed about teaching her four year old the alphabet and she didn’t know where to begin. Honestly, the most important thing you can foster in your child is a love of books! If learning the alphabet becomes a chore for your child, they will view reading as something negative instead of something fun.
Kids usually learn the first letter of their name first. We showed Pip the letter ‘S’ in books that we were reading, STOP signs on the road, and with our magnetic-letters on the fridge. Pretty soon she was excited about finding S’s everywhere! She was interested in learning more letters, so we began to introduce her to other upper-case letters and letter sounds that were meaningful to her (ie: ‘M’ for Mama.) If she wasn’t at all interested though, I wouldn’t push it.
It’s a great idea to give kids lots of exposure to the letters of the alphabet; magnetic letters on the fridge, books, maybe even an alphabet up around their room.
Kindergarten teachers have a very specific way of introducing the alphabet to students and they’re trained experts, so don’t worry if your child enters Kindergarten without knowing the alphabet. If your son or daughter has a positive relationship with books and reading, I guarantee the teacher will be pleased.