Letter Hunt

The big ideas

What the levels teach, in grown-up words.

• Letters have names, shapes and sounds. B is called bee, looks like a line with two bumps, and says the first sound in ball. Knowing all three for every letter is the start of reading.
• Big and little are the same letter. A and a are one letter in two sizes. Capitals start sentences and names; little letters do most of the work in words.
• The alphabet has an order. A, B, C, D is the order of the alphabet song. It is how dictionaries, lists and library shelves are arranged, so knowing what comes before and after a letter is a real skill.
• Vowels are special. A, E, I, O, U are the vowels: every word has at least one, and they are the letters that change sound the most. The other 21 letters are consonants.
• Capitals point things out. Names of people and places, days of the week and the word I always start with a capital letter, wherever they sit in a sentence.

Try it at home

Quick experiments that match the game.

1. Letter of the day. Pick a letter and hunt for it on cereal boxes, signs and books. Count how many you find before dinner.
2. Alphabet line. Write the letters on sticky notes, mix them up and put them in order along a wall or the floor. Then take one away and ask which is missing.
3. Sound sorting. Gather small things from around the house and sort them by their first sound: everything that starts with B in one pile, S in another.
4. Capital spotting. Read a page of a picture book together and point to every capital letter. Ask why each one is there: the start of a sentence, a name, or the word I.