A is for Alligator Preschool Craft with Printable
Are you looking for education resources that you can use with your preschooler? I am over the moon thrilled to begin sharing a letter of the week activity for preschoolers with you. Here is a great A is for alligator craft!
These letter of the alphabet crafts make excellent weekly themes and help kids with letter recognition and fine motor development.
I homeschool four of our boys. We use Sonlight’s awesome preschool curriculum which is full of memory making literature experiences. A few years back I became hungry to add more alphabet crafts to our routine for my youngest. This got me thinking, if I am looking for these activities for kids, you are too! I just did not have time to create the curriculum or activities from scratch.
These are great ideas for your homeschool, distance learning, at home daycare, preschool, mother’s day out, or just because!
Are you ready to make this fun craft and teach letters to your little one? Let me show you how to make an alligator out of uppercase letters.
SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THE POST TO DOWNLOAD THE PRINTABLE.
Supplies for A is for Alligator
- Letter A template printed on colored paper (scroll to the bottom to download)
- Alligator teeth template (scroll to the bottom to download)
- Printed letter A’s – or A’s cut out of magazines or foam letters
- 2 white circles (I used a circle punch)
- green construction paper squares
- black marker
- scissors
- glue stick or bottle
1. Apply glue to the letter A. I prefer glue sticks because they’re less messy, but my kids did need to reapply the glue as they worked.
2. Attach green “scales” to create your alligator.
3. Cut out the alligator teeth. Depending on the age/ability of your preschooler, you may need to help with this. My 2-year-old, 4-year-old, and almost 6-year-old were doing this craft together. My youngest insisted on doing some cutting himself — but as he cannot cut on lines yet, I did most of the cutting for him.
4. Glue the teeth inside the alligator’s mouth. This was a bit tough for my 2-year-old, who didn’t quite get how to line the teeth up along the mouth. I was so busy helping him I forgot to get a picture of this step – whoops!
5. Draw a black circle or oval inside each white circle for the eyes.
6. Attach eyes to the alligator.
6. Feed letter A’s to the alligator by gluing them inside his mouth. You can cut these out of magazines, use stickers, or use the printable.
My daughter, who is just finishing kindergarten, drew them herself. Your preschooler may want to do the same.
7. And here our are finished projects 🙂
Here are just a few ideas to expand your letter A exploration:
Fingerplay for letter A:
Way up high in the apple tree (arms stretched up high)
Two little apples smiled at me (point to cheeks)
I shook that tree as hard as I could (pretend to shake tree)
Down came the apples (make downward motion with arms)
Mmm, they were good! (rub stomach)
Song for letter A (my kids love this one):
Oh, I wish I was a marching army ant.
Oh, I wish I was a marching army ant.
Oh, I’d marchy way up high,
Until I could touch the sky.
Oh, I wish I was a marching army ant.
(from DLTK-teach.com)
Favorite books for letter A:
Henry’s Awful Mistake, by Robert Quackenbush
This wonderful story was one of my childhood favorites. I’m afraid that buying it new might be impossible (unless you want to pay waaay too much money), but do check your library! Henry the duck is having his friend Clara over for dinner, when he sees an ant. He tries to smash the ant with a frying pan, but it gets away. In all his efforts to get the ant, he smashes a hole in his wall, breaks a pipe, and floods his house. A little dramatic, but a great story — and it has a nice ending. 🙂
“I Can’t!” Said the Ant, by Polly Cameron
Here’s another book that’s hard to find new, but your library should carry it. Younger children might not appreciate this because the pictures are not colorful, but your older preschooler might love the story and all the interesting rhymes. The teapot falls and needs help getting up… all the items in the kitchen try to help. “Get a batallion! said the scallion…” I’m a huge fan of rhyming books for kids. They are so important for getting your child ready to read.
Ants, by Melvin & Gilda Berger
Please, snatch up any of these little readers from Melvin & Gilda Berger that you can find. This kind of nonfiction is perfect for toddlers and preschoolers. When I was teaching these types of books made reading nonfiction possible for my earliest readers.
Apples, by Samantha Berger
My 4 1/2 year old is just learning to read, and this was the first book he could read by himself. He was so proud! If your child can read numbers, he can read this book. On each page is a famous work of art featuring apples. “1 apple…2 apples….3 apples…”
Love it! I know my little man would love it too, he is loves letters 🙂
Pinning and can’t wait to make it with him!
So excited that you love it! I am thrilled to start and offer this new series!
A big warm welcome to Anna! This is great. Thanks for bringing Anna on Crystal. This is just what I need.
Thank-you for sharing this!!! What a great resource, we’ve been doing letter of the week for 2yrs here at my dayhome and I NEED new ideas!! your plan in so easy to follow and laid out really well 🙂 Love it! pinned and shared
Bobbie P
Thank you so much! My 4 year old twins will LOVE this! Thanks for not only sharing the idea but the printables as well. That makes my life so much easier! 😉
Awesome to hear Leslie! You’re very welcome!
Thank you so much for sharing these ideas! I have a 4 year old who I am homeschooling this year and I know she will love the letter crafts! Made my work a whole lot easier! Thank you for sharing this with us. I found a link to your site through pintrest. 😀
Thank you for the great ideas. I have wallpapered my hall with my grandson’s letter activities. We are looking forward to x,y,z.
I am a pre-k teacher and we just did this project in my class and they LOVED it!!! Thank you so much for sharing it really cut out a lot of time with the printables!
Yay! That is so awesome to hear Daniele. I am so happy they enjoyed it!
I don’t know how I never saw these in my news feed before, but I am totally starting this! Thanks for sharing.
way to go Momma!
with love,
-Jo
Jo- the entire series is a lot of fun!
Enjoy!
Fantastic, thank you for this activity and especially for providing the free printable sheets! I will be checking out your site further!
Jeanine
Yay! So glad you like it. We have craft for each letter of the week. Did you see them all?
Yes I did thank you SOO much. I am reviewing A B C with her this week but mainly C, cause of the holidays. I have saved the site on my favs and be working with your resources this week. I like to mix it up right. This way she doesn’t catch on or get bored lol! Thank you again I simply love your site 😀 I also appreciate the you took the time to respond. Very Nice.
Jeanine
We love doing animals for each letter! Love this and I know my girls will too! Thank you for sharing at the Thoughtful Spot Weekly Blog Spot last week! You are featured as one of my favorites this week 🙂
Super cute Alligator A craft! Pinning =)
Thanks for linking up at TGIF! Have a great weekend,
Beth
Thanks so much for this! I’m a new preschool teacher and I think my kids would enjoy this! More power 🙂
We made the alligator A craft last week and my little guy (3 years old) loved it. Thanks for the awesome ideas to help us out with our letter of the week activities!
http://weplay2learn.blogspot.com/2015/01/letter-alligator-craft.html
Yay!!! Love hearing this. So glad you guys enjoyed it!
Great ideas for my child!
Thanks for the creative ideas for my student…very arts and may involved too!
Your work and assignments/crafts you put together is far out amazing. my son is actually wanting to learn from me. because of how much fun he’s having. I love free sites that give so much to teach our future kids. makes it so much easier on the parents. I even shared it with all my mommy friends and they’ve already started some of your crafts!!! thank you so much!!! Love the Yarborough family!!
I really like your idea of having the alligator eat the letter As. We made one but it was different than your idea.
So glad you like it!