Letter T Preschool Activities (And Free Preschool Lesson Plan T is for Team!)

Whether you are planning preschool for a crowd or you just want some activities for your child, kids will love these preschool activities about teamwork. Through games, music, books, crafts, STEM, and more, today we learn all about the letter T! Kids will enjoy and learn from these creative and hands-on Letter T activities for preschool. This post includes all you need to teach the free preschool lesson plan T is for Team.

This lesson continues our alphabet lesson plan series and is intended to help make your experience teaching preschool in your home easier, educational, and more fun.

Preschool at Home

Most importantly, the best part of doing preschool at home is the chance to teach my kids (and whatever buddies are with us) the things that really matter, laugh together, and shower them with love at this young and important age. My hope is that these lesson plans and activities help you in your efforts to do the same.

If you haven’t seen my quick tips for getting started with successful home preschool, check them out.

Use and share these plans to talk, sing, read, write, and play your way through the alphabet; these kinds of activities are the foundation of building strong readers. You can use our full lesson plans, or, of course, pick individual activities to do with the Littles in your life. Lastly, I am also a budget-friendly Mama, so no worries there: our activities are always easy on the pocketbook. Now, let’s get to it!

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Visit the Preschool Lesson Plan Index to see what free plans are published or in the works!

Update: You can now get ALL of the Alphabet Lesson Plans, Checklists, and Printables, (plus Bonus Ideas and 75+ exclusive preschool printables!) all in one budget-friendly digital product…A to Z and Beyond! Preschool Curriculum.

INTRODUCTION

First off, gather on the floor for circle time and start with a welcome song. We have been singing, “Hello to All the Children of the World”. Each week we have been briefly spotlighting one of the countries or features in the song.

Earlier we talked about the line that says, “We speak in many different ways!” One way to speak that is not in the song is with sign language.

Today, we’ll learn signs to represent the line “Though some things may be different.”

Each of these words can be found in this super helpful signing dictionary that shows how to make the signs.

To make the sign for “though,” hold your hands open in front of you, palms facing your chest, and then move hands back and forth so the fingers brush each other. We can sign “things” by holding the hands open, palms facing up, right on top of left, and then bobbing the right hand forward. We make the sign for “might” or “maybe” by holding the hands open, palms facing up, and moving them up and down slightly. Lastly, “Different,” as we learned earlier, is signed by beginning with the pointer fingers crossed, then pointing them away from each other.

Sing the song again, reviewing all the signs learned so far.

Write: Toothpick Writing with the Letter T

I introduced how today we are learning about the letter T. Both the uppercase and lowercase letter T are made of straight shapes.

I showed a picture of the letter T, and then I said that we can make a T from objects that begin with T…toothpicks! I gave my Little some toothpicks to form an uppercase and lowercase T.

Are there any other letters we can make from only straight shapes? Little #4 made a few other letters she knows like capital E, H, I, and K.

Play: Letter T Sound Bag

I briefly introduced the sound of the letter T. Then we used a Sound Bag to practice.

The kids took turns reaching into the bag without looking and pulling out an object. We would say the name of the object together, emphasizing the T sound. By the time they finished, we had a big pile of letter-T objects.

Some objects you could put in the bag include a toothbrush, towel, toy turtle or triceratops, triangular item, tractor, truck, tree, or teapot.

Play and Write: Tic-Tac-Toe

A fun game that begins with the letter T is Tic-Tac-Toe. Little #4 hasn’t played it much yet, so it was really fun for her to learn the rules and play several times.

In order to play Tic-Tac-Toe, draw a large hashtag signs. One person is X’s and one person is O’s. Take turns drawing your symbol in one of the sections of the hashtag. The winner is the person who gets three of their symbols in a row.

With a larger group, you can also do a quick Tic-Tac-Toe Tournament. So the winners play each other until you have an overall champion.

We use paper in page protectors and write with dry erase markers for various activities. It worked great for this game because we could play over and over without wasting paper.

Read: Oh, Say Can You Say? by Dr. Seuss

Another fun activity that begins with the letter T is saying Tongue Twisters.

Dr. Seuss’s book Oh, Say Can You Say? is a fun one full of tongue twisters.

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Play: Tongue Twisters

We practiced saying a few tongue twisters like Peter Piper, Sally Sells Seashells, and Fuzzy Wuzzy Was a Bear, as well as some of the phrases from the book.

Talk: T is for Team

After tongue twisters, it was time to get into the main topic for the lesson. We sat in our circle time space and talked about T is for Team.

We discussed questions like the following. What is a team? (It’s a group of people working together.) Can you think of any teams? (We talked about sports teams, our family, and she thought of Pip and Freddy from T.O.T.S.) Which characteristics make a good teammate? (Things like trust, work ethic, and kindness.)

We did a quick object lesson. I handed Little #4 a toothpick and asked her to break it. That wasn’t a super easy task for her, but she was able to do it. Next, I gave her a handful of toothpicks and asked her to break them. She couldn’t.

We talked briefly about how people are like those toothpicks; we are stronger when we work together.

Sing: “The More We Get Together”

We sang “The More We Get Together.” It is a simple, classic song that we often sing.

Read: Tractor Mac Teamwork by Billy Steers

Tractor Mac Teamwork is about the team on the farm learning to work together in order to build a swimming pond. One tractor discovers that it is better to work together than try to do a big job all by yourself.

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Play: Team Games

We spent a lot of time playing games together. If you have a larger group, it might be fun to do a more competitive relay race, three-legged race, or team sport. Because there were just the two of us this time, we did some Team Tasks rather than competitive games.

Our Team Tasks centered on getting a ping pong ball from one end of the hall into a bucket at the other end of the hall. We could not touch the ball with our hands, and each time there was a twist to the challenge.

One time we had to stay on our own sides of the hall, so we had to pass a spoon and the ball half-way down the hall like a relay.

Another time we had our legs tied together like a three-legged race.

A third time she could touch a spoon but not the floor, and I could touch the floor but not the spoon. (This was by far her favorite as she got to ride piggy back!)

Another twist was that for one round one of us could hold the spoon but wore a blindfold, while the other person could see but not touch the spoon.

We took turns doing the different roles and had a fun time working together on these different tasks.

Sing: “Take Me Out to the Ball Game”

Just as we worked together to complete our tasks, sports teams work together to play a game. These sports are fun for the teams to play and fun for others to watch. We sang “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”

Read: The Great Big Enormous Turnip by Alexei Tolstoy and Helen Oxenbury

In The Great Big Enormous Turnip by Alexei Tolstoy and Helen Oxenbury, a group must work together to pull the giant turnip from the ground. It’s a fun example of how people can do more together than they can on their own.

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Play: Toothpick Engineering

Our next activity was to work together to accomplish three Toothpick Engineering Challenges. (There is that T for Toothpick again!) There are more explanations and pictures in this post: Toothpick Engineering: Preschool STEM Activity.

These challenges were fun and also got my Little thinking and developing important STEM skills.

Supplies for Toothpick Engineering

This preschool STEM activity is so simple! The materials are readily available. Here is what you will need.

• Mini Marshmallows
• Toothpicks (Round Toothpicks seem to be stronger and therefore better for this activity.)
• Copycat Challenge Cards (24 Cards covering 3 Levels, included in the FREE LESSON PLAN CHECKLIST)
• Ruler
• Paper
• Pennies

The Three Engineering Challenges

• Challenge #1: Copycat
  • The Copycat Challenge Cards are included in the FREE LESSON PLAN CHECKLIST. Draw a card and build the figure that is pictured. There are 24 cards covering three levels of difficulty. We also took turns building a design and having the other person copy it.
• Challenge #2: Tallest Tower
  • Build the tallest tower possible with toothpicks and marshmallows. Use the ruler to measure the tower, and then experiment with a different design. Try to beat your own record.
• Challenge #3: Bridge Builder
  • Using the marshmallows, toothpicks, and a piece of paper, build a bridge. Put pennies on the bridge one at a time to test its strength. Investigate the strength of different designs.

Request the Toothpick Engineering Copycat Challenge Cards be sent to your inbox with the FREE LESSON PLAN CHECKLIST.

My Little really enjoyed Toothpick Engineering. We have done it several times since introducing it during Mommy Preschool. I hope it’s a hit with your Littles too!

Sing: “Let’s Get Together”

After Toothpick Engineering, I turned on “Let’s Get Together” from the old Disney Parent Trap movie with Hayley Mills. While the music played, we did some simple swing moves and danced together.

Craft: Paper People Chain

Teams can be made of dancers, athletes, family members, or friends. For a fun craft, we made a team of people by cutting and decorating a people chain. The supplies you need are paper, pencil, scissors, template (optional, included in the FREE LESSON PLAN CHECKLIST), and decorating materials like crayons, stickers, etc.

How To Make a Paper People Chain

1. Fold a piece of paper hamburger ways. Next fold each edge back toward the middle. This will make the paper look like an accordion or fan fold with four sections.
2. With the paper folded, trace a template (included in the FREE LESSON PLAN CHECKLIST) or draw a picture of a person. Make sure that the template or picture touches each side of the folded paper.
3. Cut around the picture. Do NOT cut where the picture touches the folded edges. Open to reveal your people chain. Color or decorate!

For some preschoolers, cutting the paper people chain might be too difficult, resulting in severed paper limbs. 😉 In this case, either help the preschooler cut the image or cut it for them.

If the paper people chain is too hard altogether, consider one of these alternate crafts about teams:

• Create a team symbol together for your preschool group or family.
• Each person paint or draw one paper tile and put them together in a quilt or mosaic.
• Using magazines, crayons, and other craft supplies, create a collage about teams.

Eat: Foods that Start with the Letter T

Some foods that start with the letter T include tomatoes, toast, turkey, tuna, toaster pastries, Tostitos, Twix, Tater Tots, Twizlers, tangerines, taquitos, or tarts.

We made mini tarts on a different day which was a really fun extension activity. If you don’t make everything from scratch like in this recipe for mini pies, it would be easier to make them during preschool.

Play: Team Storytelling

While we ate, we did a team storytelling game. One person starts the story. Whenever that person wants to, he or she says, “And then…” at which point the next person continues the story.

My kids love this game. We play it on car rides and other times. When my big boys play, our characters tend to get killed off in crazy ways, so you may need to add parameters to make sure everyone gets a chance to tell part of the story.

Talk: Teams in Nature

Did you know that there are teams in nature too? Sometimes animals work together to help each other. In nature when two different kinds of animals do this, it can be called mutualism or a symbiotic relationship. We took a minute to talk about a few examples of teams in nature.

One nature team is the kifaru (rhinoceros) and the oxpecker (tickbird). The oxpecker eats ticks off of the back of the kifaru. So the rhino provides food for the bird and the bird gets rid of ticks that bother the rhino.

Another nature team is the sea anemone and hermit crab. The anemone will get on the back of the hermit crab as it travels along the ocean floor. This is helpful for the crab because the anemone scares away octopuses and other predators. It is also helpful for the anemone because the crab scares starfish and fireworms that might eat the anemone.

You can find many more examples of nature teams in this article about symbiosis.

Sing: Goodbye Song

We closed up by reviewing our letter of the day: what Letter T looks and sounds like. Next we reviewed what a team is and how we can each be a good member of our different teams. Teamwork is important!

Lastly, we sang our goodbye song and see you next week!

Our next preschool lesson will be Letter U is for Up! It has a lot of fun activities!

Leave a comment and share what activities your Littles are enjoying, what types of posts you’d like to see, or any other questions or thoughts you have. I love hearing from you. Share pictures on social media using #lovinlifewithlittles. Thanks for visiting, and Happy Preschooling!

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