Kids Learning Games: Bathtub I-Spy

We’ve been wanting to do this activity in our backyard water table, but this week has been so chilly where we live that  we decided  to play it in the bathtub. My kids love playing in the water so bath time is long and chock full of learning opportunities. My son loves to try and spell new words and practice his letters and numbers with our foam bath letter/number set. Today’s activity is a simple alphabet game to practice identifying sounds at the beginning of words. Materials Needed:

• plastic toys that can go in the water (use larger ones for littler kids)
• foam alphabet letters (we bought ours in the bath time aisle at Target)
• water! (bathtub, sink, water table, kiddie pool, etc.)

How to Play:

1. Drop a variety of alphabet letters and plastic toys into the tub (put fewer toys/letters for younger kids, more for older kids).
2. Say an alphabet sound and have your child hunt for the letter and an object that begin with that sound. For example, “Can you find an object that begins with the /b/ sound?”… then “Ok, now that you find the boat, can you find the letter that it starts with?” Play for awhile with different letters/sounds/objects.
3. Next have your child choose a toy from the tub and tell you the object’s name. Ask, “What sound do you hear at the beginning of that word?” Then have your child hunt for the letter that makes that sound. Pair the objects with the letters in a special place and then move on to another letter/sound/object.

For Younger Kids: Just call out an object or an object characteristic and see if your child can find it. For example, “Can you find the blue pointy ball?”  Then practice saying the words with your child. You can practice colors, new vocabulary words, and descriptive words with little ones.

For Older Kids: Instead of practicing beginning sounds, work on medial or ending sounds. For example, “You found the duck. Can you find the letter duck ends with?” Even older kids can spell the entire word… assuming you have enough alphabet letters! Here are a few other Quirky Momma bathtub favorites: Bathtub Alphabet Soup Bathtub Painting DIY Bath Toys Do you have any other fun ways that you like to teach your kids with water or in the bathtub?