F is for ... : Themed Activities

F is a favourite letter featured after E

Footloose and Fancy free, F is followed up by G  

How many F sounds can you see?

Focus your eyes and find them with me!


This is my introduction to the letter 'F' in rhyme.  😃

Firetrucks and Firefighters! This one is in honour of my son who is almost done his firefighting training!  We got some really cute fire rescue related stickers online for an activity but you can also just play.  Do you see a firetruck?  A hydrant? The colour red?  

Sing along to the  "Hurry, Hurry, Drive the Firetruck" song:  As you sing each verse of the song. add the parts (ladder, hose, siren, wheels) onto the firetruck cut-out or onto the drawing of a firetruck.  Another song featuring /f/ is "Five Green and Speckled Frogs" and another is the theme song to "Frozen."

Create 25 Firefighter /F/ flashcards:  The firefighter makes the cards extra cool. Practice words like: five, fire, four, family, frog, fan, flower, flamingo, fish, feet, farm, football, fruit, fairy, face, feather, fly, finger, fork, fence, food, foal, flag, fries, firefighter 

Facilitate dramatic play.  Emergency workers is one idea. Maybe there is a ladder to climb or a hose to spray or a helmet to put on or first aid required by the teddy bears.  Another idea is to be a chef making fries and frankfurters by the waterfront or fruit salad and fountain drinks for the family to take to the field 

Food Frenzy:  Whether in real life or in play, practice the /f/ sound with food.  Create a menu with faluda, floats, fruit salad, falafels, frittatas, fajitas, frankfurters, fish, fries, french toast, flans, flatbreads, flapjacks, fettuccine, 

Phonics Fun:  Find /f; words in the environment or in a book.  Notice whether the word has an /f/ or /ph/ making the sound (phone, photo, phonics, phantom, laugh, trough). Maybe you could use a fly swatter to "catch" f words or 'flies' flashcards.

Finger plays:  The Itsy Bitsy Spider, Five Little Monkeys, Open Them, Shut Them, Opposites and Mr. Thumbkin are examples of free activities that just require a hand and a some animated sharing of the rhyme to create fantastic interactions.

Physical Activities: Play Follow Me and have them copy all the crazy things you do as you move through the room.  Play Frisbee, Foursquare or Football. Have a Fancy Footwork Dance-off competition for fun!

Family Games  Ideas include Go Fish, True or False? Headbanz with famous people, Fairy-opoly and Four in a Row.

Financial Fortunes:  Learn about Canadian money and/or coins from around the world. Pretend to buy things with toy money.  Host a sale of some kind.  Note:  If you are looking to reduce the toys in your home, you can always have your children sell you things they are willing to part with.  The bit of cash they get will thrill them and the reduced cleanup will make it worthwhile for you too!  You can also make "fortune tellers" by paper folding.  It is easy to find directions online.

First Aid: First Aid is science related.  So is the "Fluid or solid?" experiment with cornstarch and water,  The life cycle of a frog, how fireflies make their lights, the inner workings of a Formula One racecar and magnetic forcefields are additional science topics related to 'f''.


As you can see, the ideas were too numerous for the  letter F to just focus on one. I hope they give you some ideas of ways to enjoy building literacy skills in everyday life for your family and friends.  

*One final addition, if your child struggles to say the /f/ sound, we say to put our teeth on our lower lip like a rabbit and breathe out.  Practice first at the sound level before building it into speech. These activities are great for exposure and practice too!



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