Welcome to Week 26 of Freedom Homeschooling’s Letter of the Week preschool curriculum!

If you are new to the Letter of the Week curriculum, please start here, for information, the supply list, and the free 185-page downloadable workbook that accompanies the curriculum.

Week 26: Letter U Activities

Week 26 of our Letter of the Week preschool curriculum covers the letter U and the number twenty. This week will focus on the short U sound (as in umbrella and under). The long U sound (as in unicycle and ukulele) will be covered in Week 35.

In Week 26, your child will also learn direction words, position words, and more.

Letter U Activities: Day 1

• Sing the alphabet song with your child.
• Learn about the letter U on Starfall. On each screen of this interactive activity, your child will need to click the letter U, wait for the animation to play, or complete the activity to get the green arrow to appear. Then, he/she will click the green arrow to go to the next screen.
• Show your child how to write an upper and lowercase U, and have him complete the worksheet on page 126 of the workbook.
• Watch Up to the Ceiling. Encourage your child to sing along.
• Optional: Choose an activity, a recipe to prepare together, or a snack from the list of additional activities near the end of this page.

Letter U Activities: Day 2

• Watch The Letter U Song by Bounce Patrol.
• Read Up, Up Umbrella by Beck Spence.
• Show your child how to write the number 20 and help him/her complete page 127 of the workbook.
• Practice counting to twenty with your child using blocks, beads, or other household objects.
• Watch Mr. Klein read Inside, Outside, Upside Down by Stan and Jan Berenstain.
• Watch Up to the Ceiling and sing along.
• Optional: Choose an activity, a recipe to prepare together, or a snack from the list of additional activities near the end of this page.

Letter U Activities: Day 3

• Watch Up to the Ceiling and sing along.
• On workbook page 128, help your child trace and write the letter U. Read the words under the pictures to him/her.
• Read The Ugly Duckling retold by Brandi Chase to your child. You will find the book listed under “2nd and 3rd Grade Books.” It’s a PDF download.
• Optional: Choose an activity, a recipe to prepare together, or a snack from the list of additional activities near the end of this page.

Letter U Activities: Day 4

• Watch Up to the Ceiling and sing along.
• On workbook page 129, help your child write and trace the number 20s. Have your child use a dot marker to mark twenty boxes in the ten frames. You may want to place something under the worksheet to protect your table, because the dot markers tend to soak through paper.
• Practice counting to twenty with your child using blocks, beads, or other household objects.
• Watch Lila’s mom read Up in the Garden, Down in the Dirt by Kate Messner.
• Optional: Choose an activity, a recipe to prepare together, or a snack from the list of additional activities near the end of this page.

Letter U Activities: Day 5

• Watch the Letter U Phonics Song by Little Fox.
• Watch Miss Sassycat read Ella’s Umbrellas by Jennifer Loyd.
• Have your child color the picture on workbook page 130.
• Watch Up to the Ceiling and sing along.
• Optional: Choose an additional activity, a recipe to prepare together, or a snack from the list below.

Additional Letter U Activities

• Writing- Have your child practice writing the letter U or the number twenty with his/her finger in a tray of sand, rice, or dried beans.
• Arts and crafts- draw underneath and upside down, umbrella craft, or paint an underwater ocean scene
• Science- make bubbles and experiment with blowing them up into the air
• Field trip- watch underwater animals at an aquarium or pet store, explore all the ways to go up, under, and upside down at a playground, look for something to upcycle at a thrift store, or visit a building under construction (from a safe distance)
• Recipe- pineapple upside-down cake
• Snacks- Goldfish crackers or Swedish Fish candies for an “underwater” themed snack or any snack served upside down (such as cheese and crackers with the cracker on top of the cheese)

Review Activities

If your child has finished all the Week 26 activities, and time allows, you may want to choose some Week 25 activities to repeat or complete any you weren’t able to get to last week. Week 25 reviewed letters P through T.

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Build a Home Library

If you would like to buy any of the books from this week’s video read alouds, you can use these links to find them on Amazon.

• Inside, Outside, Upside Down by Stan and Jan Berenstain
• Up in the Garden, Down in the Dirt by Kate Messner
• Ella’s Umbrellas by Jennifer Loyd

Supply Reminder

Remember to look ahead to Week 27, decide which activities you would like to do with your child, and make sure you have the necessary supplies on hand.