Search results matching tag 'letter magnets'

Build a Banner

Anonymous — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 22:00:00 GMT

We're celebrating some glimpses of blue sky this week! Hooray!

Want to celebrate a special day, season or event? Want to let your kids decorate something with their name or a favorite saying? Want some new stickers or fridge magnets?

font style 2

font style 1

Here you go!

Just print,

cut and hang.

I'm obsessed with banners. I know I'm not alone on this! Banner making is a terrific kid project as well, so I made some simple banner images to be printed on white cardstock for the kids to decorate whenever the celebratory mood strikes.

My two year old adding a few more details to the back

These are also great for printing on colored paper to go along with whichever special occasion we're celebrating, I'm not much of a scrapbooker these days, but I do have about a million tons of colored cardstock and cute scrapbook paper. (Another obsession!?!) So, I can customize these banners to match any holiday or theme, while putting my paper stash to good use.

The smaller versions printed on sticker sheets or magnets are perfect for word building fun. I also love to use mini-banners in gift wrapping.

Our fridge isn't magnetic, so we use this magnet board instead.

If you'd like your own set, you can get the free download two ways. Either download the letters you need from my Flickr page or download the whole document as a pdf file from my Scribd page.

You can probably figure out how to print and assemble these, but for specifics, read on...

From Flickr:

Download the directions and the letters you’d like to print, along with the pennants you plan to use as end pieces or to separate words. Two different font styles are available.
Once you've downloaded to a folder on your computer, highlight each image, right click and print. At this point you will probably see your photo size options. (Full page, 4 x 6, 5 x 7…) For the larger banners pictured, I chose 5 x 7. For stickers and magnets, I used the contact sheet option. Uncheck the “fit picture to frame” box.
Load your favorite colored cardstock into the printer and you’re all set to print. (I recommend solid colors, or a subtle pattern.) You can also print directly on adhesive sticker paper, or magnet sheets. FYI: The magnet sheets almost broke my printer, so I just printed on card stock and glued it to the sheet before cutting.
Cut, hang, (or stick), and enjoy! For the cutout circles, I printed them as 5 x 7 images and used a 2 1/2 inch circle punch like this. I attached my "spring" banner with brads, and I glued the circle banner to twine. You can also punch holes in the corners and string, hang with little clothes pins, etc.

From Scribd:

Choose the document with the font style you'd like.
Download the whole set as a pdf.
Insert your favorite cardstock and print the pages you need.
Hang. These print slightly larger than 5 x 7, so if you want to cut the circles out, you need to use a 3 inch circle punch.

If you use these, let me know. I'd love to see your banners in action!

Build a Banner

Anonymous — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 22:00:00 GMT

We're celebrating some glimpses of blue sky this week! Hooray!

Want to celebrate a special day, season or event? Want to let your kids decorate something with their name or a favorite saying? Want some new stickers or fridge magnets?

font style 2

font style 1

Here you go!

Just print,

cut and hang.

My two year old adding a few more details to the back

The smaller versions printed on sticker sheets or magnets are perfect for word building fun. I also love to use mini-banners in gift wrapping.

Our fridge isn't magnetic, so we use this magnet board instead.

Download the directions and the letters you’d like to print, along with the pennants you plan to use as end pieces or to separate words. Two different font styles are available.
Once you've downloaded to a folder on your computer, highlight each image, right click and print. At this point you will probably see your photo size options. (Full page, 4 x 6, 5 x 7…) For the larger banners pictured, I chose 5 x 7. For stickers and magnets, I used the contact sheet option. Uncheck the “fit picture to frame” box.
Load your favorite colored cardstock into the printer and you’re all set to print. (I recommend solid colors, or a subtle pattern.) You can also print directly on adhesive sticker paper, or magnet sheets. FYI: The magnet sheets almost broke my printer, so I just printed on card stock and glued it to the sheet before cutting.
Cut, hang, (or stick), and enjoy! For the cutout circles, I printed them as 5 x 7 images and used a 2 1/2 inch circle punch like this. I attached my "spring" banner with brads, and I glued the circle banner to twine. You can also punch holes in the corners and string, hang with little clothes pins, etc.

From Scribd:

Choose the document with the font style you'd like.
Download the whole set as a pdf.
Insert your favorite cardstock and print the pages you need.
Hang. These print slightly larger than 5 x 7, so if you want to cut the circles out, you need to use a 3 inch circle punch.

If you use these, let me know. I'd love to see your banners in action!

Alphabet Magnets

Anonymous — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 18:02:00 GMT

Since I've been on the subject of magnetic dry erase boards, how about some alphabet magnet ideas?

(image source)

This wooden set above is seriously the coolest set I've ever seen. (via a great post on Growing a Green Family) Too bad it's also the most expensive. It's awesome because kids actually use the pieces to build letters, so it's more of a puzzle than a standard alphabet set. I LOVE it.

(image source)

I also like these animal magnets (above), but I probably wouldn't use them for word building because I think the pictures might be distracting. I would use them for sorting activities, and I think they would be perfect for storytelling. You could draw a setting on the dry erase board, and use the magnets as characters. How about an animal alphabet story along the lines of Chicka Chicka Boom, Boom?

(image source)

And from Etsy: I like these stuffed felt alphabet letters, and these custom magnetic fabric letters

If you're going with a more traditional version, I like this wooden set from Melissa and Doug. Apparently the back surface is entirely magnetic, which means they stick better than the original plastic variety.

Here is version of regular magnets jazzed up with white spray paint.

I love this word families set , this set for teaching blends and letter/sound correspondence, and this prefixes and suffixes set, all from Lakeshore.

These are nice because they have upper and lowercase letters, and they come with a gazillion in a set.

We have the following sets:
These have bold letters, neutral color, and decent but not awesome magnet strength. Great for basic word building activities. (Ours seem to be smudging a bit for some reason.)
These, which my 23 month old adores. They are a bit larger, have strong magnets and make lots of noise.
And these which are ok when you use them with the magnetic surface included, but they don't stick very well on most other magnetic surfaces. They also come with shapes for creating pictures, Colorforms style, which is super fun.

Note: After I set up my handy little magnet/red board system, I realized that half of our magnets wouldn't stick to the surface. Keep this in mind if you're planning to purchase a magnetic dry erase board. Some really are more attractive than others. :)

We still have to pay attention to magnet safety around our house because of our little one. He seems to be over the putting everything in his mouth stage, but I'm still avoiding the little mighty magnets due to the dangers these pose if ingested. It's a bit of a trick to find the perfect magnets for our situation. Basically, we have to keep the smaller magnets up high. And for the magnets to keep within his reach, I need something large with a super strong magnet that covers the entire back surface of the letter. Plus, I'd like them to be cute. :) So...I'm working on a few sets of these:

(image source)

Cute, huh? And they're pretty easy to make. Here is tutorial from The Purl Bee. I'll be cutting them out while I watch my favorite season premieres this week.

Oh, and check out this post from Young House Love. They have a clever idea for creating a magnetic wall!

Do you have a favorite alphabet magnet set?

Making Words and Letter Magnets

Anonymous — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 13:23:00 GMT

Recently, I read Horrible Harry and the Ant Invasion to my boys. In one chapter, Ms. Mackle asked Harry and his classmates to brainstorm words that contain the word "ant." Pants, plant, pennant...

This made me think about some word building activities that we could do with magnetic letters on our new red board.

Word Inside a Word
(The activity described above, with magnetic alphabet letters)

I make a small word like "ant" with magnetic letters
Kids brainstorm words that sound like they contain that word part. This is a great way to practice really listening to word parts to identify individual sounds.
I write the rest of the letters to complete their words, using a dry erase marker.
Repeat with other word parts--Have kids generate word part ideas too.

Making Words
One of my favorite activities in the classroom was Patricia Cunningham's Making Words. The program is wonderful, and if you're a teacher, I highly recommend it. It helps students identify letter sounds and spelling patterns, and then transfer what they learn to be able to spell and read new words on their own.

My first grader and I are trying a simplified home version like this...

Choose a word, preferably one that has some relevance for the child. A seasonal word, a word related to his hobby, etc.
Arrange the magnets that spell the word in random order on the white board.
Challenge the child to come up with as many words as possible, using the letters you've put on the board.*
Then, for the BIG challenge, have the child make a word that uses all of the letters you've put on the board. (The "BIG" word.)

*A few suggestions:

You may want to give hints to guide your child in word building. For example, "Try making a word with two letters." "Great, you made the word do." Now can you add a letter g to make a new word, dog?" "Now let's change the d to an h, what word do we have?"
Try sounding out some words together, saying the sounds for each word separately, then saying the whole word: "D-O-G, Dog"
Have your child arrange the magnets to make the word, then you or the child can write the word on large sticky notes, index cards or sentence strips. That way the magnets will still be available to use for more word making, and you can use the word cards to sort words according to beginning letter sound.

Have you used the Making Words program? What are your favorite word building activities?