I have had so many questions about beads lately that I figured it was probably time to do a little Bead-ology 101 follow-up from last summers post.
I think the majority of everyone has letter beads of some kind or flavor laying around their room somewhere. Sometimes it’s those tiny little square capital letter beads or another small pony type bead but if you are lucky, you have a set of these sweet little beads.
I love these because they are colorful and sturdy and the lettering doesn’t wipe off over time…the bead IS the letter. But, of course, my number one question regarding beads is…where can I get them?
So here it is. If you’d like the lowercase version you can get them by clicking on the picture below:
If you’d like the capital letter version, then click on this picture. (FYI…I have both! I just couldn’t resist.)
I know what you’re thinking now…”ok, I have them, now what do I do with them?”
They are a great tool. No doubt but unless there is a purpose your kiddos are going to start using them inappropriately or not at all.
**** PLEASE NOTE: The pictures below are of my original Bead Freebie in action. It has since been revamped and improved but I didn’t want to remove pictures that have been pinned. So if you have my original Bead Freebie, please reload it and get the updated (editable) version HERE.
At the beginning of the year, with my kiddos that do not have letter mastery. I do a lot of sorting by color,
‘in my name/not in my name’ work and
letter matching
and sorting capitals and lowercase letters.
The easiest way I find to store the letters when I using these activities is to place them in one of these chip divider plate thingies that I also use for sorting by color. (I know there is a technical term but it escapes me at the moment).
Just as a note, you can get the materials shown above as a freebie just by click on the pictures, but if you would rather, you can also use the letter chart I made that includes pictures for matching your beads as well.
This would give those kiddos who need to have a break from magnetic letters a little something new to keep them engaged. It would work the same way as the magnets, just place the chart on a cookie sheet to keep the beads from falling all over the place and have students match the beads to the letter and sound it represents.
From here, you can use your beads to work on letter order. When I do this with my kinders, I either provide them with one of these little plastic organizers (I prefer this because they can grab and go anywhere in the room)
or it they are at a station that is staionary, I provide one of these labeled drawer units.
I just labeled this one with vinyl letters made on my Silhouette. (I love that machine by the way. I only have the little one but I hope to upgrade to the Cameo someday. I’ve had both a Cricut and a Silhouette and I prefer the Silhouette much more. You can find out more about these awesome cutters if you would like by clicking here.!)
Either way, the work they do is independent and self-correcting (I LOVE that!!!) These cards ask them to identify missing letters. After they have beaded the letters and written them, they open the card to see if they were correct. Easy!
My students use beads for practicing their sight words.
And as your students start to learn their letter sounds and begin segmenting, you can offer other bead activities like this CVC and CVCC/CCVC one.
Or my latest digraphs for later on in kindergarten or for review in first grade.
There are also differentiated recording sheets for this one because so many people requested I add one something that students could use to take home and show parents what they had being doing.
Oh and my last advice, never use string for letter bead work. Do yourself a favor and use pipe cleaners. I even cut mine down to make them more manageable.
I hope this answered most of your bead questions but if not, definitely drop me a note.
And just for fun, cuz I’m feeling the need for a little fun today, if you leave me a comment with a suggestion for another new bead unit along with your email, I will pick a couple a people to win my new digraph unit.
My three boys will choose three numbers between 1 and 30 to pick the winner. Make sure you leave me your email with a suggestion to qualify. When I get 30 comments, I announce the winners.
With more than 20 years of teaching experience, it is my pleasure to bring you my most favorite ideas and activities to keep young learners engaged and loving learning.
My bead unit would be CVC words and word families. My Kinder-minion would love manipulating the beads to make words. As an added bonus, they could create nonsense words to further stretch their phonics abilities.
Thanks so much for this great post! Color words, number words, and possibly sight words would be great! I haven’t used the letter beads, but look forward to getting me a set of the lowercase and uppercase letters.
I like the idea of having a CVCE set. They could spell the cvc word and then see how the E comes on and changes the word. I love your idea for the organization drawers. I need one of those.
I have some of those beads from the sight word string up center!! Love those beads! One thing I might suggest (though the color is beautiful) is to have a black and white version for those of us that have to print at home:) Thanks for the chance!! Susan si******@*******al.net
You already offer so many wonderful options with these! They are great! I typically use letter beads for sight words and spelling words. What about a monthly theme vocabulary, math words, science words, etc? IDK, I’m trying to think of some word work that you don’t already have an option for!
How about blends?? All of the others I thought of someone else mentioned! Color words, number words, and more sight words. Maybe some vowel teams for first grade?? Cy**********@***il.com
Thanks for the pipe cleaner hint – why didn’t I think of that before???? What about word wall words (since Gwen has already suggested CVC, which was my first thought)? Na*****@*****il.com
These are great! I’m thinking of sorts that have to do with letter formation, sort tails/no tails, curves/straight lines, etc. Or using the bead letters to make color words. Or after they have mastered letters in their name, not in their name, they could use the bead letters to make their friends names (mine always like working with their friends names as well). Thanks for all the great bead letter products, I’m off to order some now! ni**********@*******al.net
I would love to see word families as we do a lot of that. Sight words would be great too, but could be tricky since everyone uses different ones. Would it be too hard to make editable sight word sheets? These letter beads and your kits are on my must have list for this next year! Awesome! lb*****@*******kc.net
What about some sets to go with math vocabulary? number words, shapes, etc.? I used them mostly with sight words with my kinders last year. They really enjoyed them. I too cut pipe cleaners for the students to use instead of string. They are much easier to manipulate!
Thank you for this timely message. UPS just dropped off three new bead sets today, and I bought a toddler style lacing bead set from Kohls a few weeks ago. Next on my MUST HAVE list are the letter beads. I’d love to see a ‘labeling’ activity based on social studies/science concepts. I’d, also, love to see a combine math vocab activity where they make shapes with the beads and spell the term with beads and/or a show your work activity where they build their number sentence with beads and show their part/part/whole with beads, too.
Love this idea! They will be perfect to help with fine motor skills as well as all the cognitive benefits. How about a holiday theme, Halloween or Christmas? Ho*********@***oo.ca
I love the bead sets and use them all the time! lk********@*****il.com I have purchased the number beads and use them for math stations so how about a unit with beads?
I love the idea of using these beads! I think that the kids would really use them. My students would love to build their friend’s names using the class directory. I would also find a missing medial vowel sound unit helpful in my classroom. Thanks for your hard work creating these super resources!
I never would have thought to put the beads into a case like I do for my stamps. What about having beads with vocabulary for science or social studies? I love the bead units. I am going to add those beads to my growing wish list along with the silhouette. Thanks for sharing! Laura ln*****@*********************ol.com
Oh Angie, I have the sight word unit. All 220 words. It’s huge. I’m glad your kiddos have loved using the beads. Mine too. Good luck on your entry. Marsha
My beads are already on the way from Amazon. I am so glad they are the ones you use because they are a great size. I would love to see a CVCe unit also like others have said. Also, one with color words and number words. We cover these at the beginning of school! Thanks for making these.
Why not make sentences with missing words? Students could complete the sentence with the beads- sight words or phonetic words could be used and allows students to practice a bit of reading.. Da******@***il.com
Darn it! I think you’re at 30, but JUST IN CASE I thought I would share that I love this. I put the beads in my Amazon cart. I think it is a great fine motor activity on top of the HF words, CVC, etc. I was thinking of digraphs? Another thought… but you would need a long pipe cleaner or two side by side is to practice sentences. You wouldn’t have the punctuation but I think it would be a really good visual for them to see the spacing.
I inherited about 1,000 of these beads from a friend who moved up to third grade and wasn’t sure WHERE to start with them….NOW I know…I am SOOOO excited to pull them out now…YEAH!
I would love to see something with sentences like filling in a missing word or using a list of words and a picture to make a sentence! Love all of your stuff. al*********@***il.com
I love these beads! And I’m really looking forward to using them in different ways. CVC words would be great. I will be putting this unit on my wishlist.
How about a worksheet that could be customized to help kids with the letters in their names? I teach special needs PK kids and this is where we’ll start this year! cl*****@***il.com
I’m pretty sure I missed being one of the first 30, but I want you to know that I haven’t met a product of yours yet that I haven’t loved! 🙂 I have already ordered these beads from your previous post and can’t wait for them to arrive at my front door. I would love to see a set that spells out color words, shape words (with a section for kids to draw the shape when they write the word), and also number words 0-20 (with a section for kids to draw the # of items and practice writing the numeral and number word). Thanks again for all your great products. 🙂 am*********@***oo.com
Wow! Such kind words. Thanks so much. I love your ideas. I’m writing them down, and I’ll have something out before school starts. Thanks so much. Marsha
I would also love to see color and number words. I start the year with my fours class with each child having their name in a pencil box with a pipe cleaner and they make their name. Sometimes we have to work without the pipe cleaners to start until they learn which direction each letter should go. Your starter kit is perfect for my young class. I have also put color words in pencil box that matches word (r e d in a red box) with a pipe cleaner and they make the word. Kathy Ka*********@***oo.com
My school uses the Jolly Phonics program. Most of my students seem to struggle with the vowel pairs though. So instead of just CVC or CVCe units, I would love to see one that gave them added practice with vowel pairs. Erin em******@***il.com
I love using letter beads in my classroom! What about a set with a missing beginning or ending letter? Many times my kids need a lot of work isolating these sounds and this would be a fun way to do it.
Hi there, I did purchase these lovely letters after I read your book study for chapter three. I love them! I am going to do what you do but I am also going to use them in the sensory table with sand or rice. The students have to go fishing to find the letters in their name and thread their name with pipe cleaners that are attached to a makeshift fishing pole.
Thanks for the link to the capital beads. I had been looking for them for forever! I wanted to do the kid’s names with them. I have the stuff for this idea (that I saw on Hedisongs.com, I believe), but haven’t put them together yet. She used small plastic pencil boxes that have a flap with a snap closure that you get at office supply places (usually sell for $1 each, I purchased them at a back to school sale for a quarter each!) She puts a color word, sight word, etc in foam letters on the box and then puts the corresponding letter beads and a pipe cleaner in the pencil box. The student picks out a box and then makes the word.
I just love your work! I particularly love the sight words “Bead It”, but they are all fantastic! I will be directing the other K & 1 teachers to this idea!! 🙂 Vivian
These are all great ideas! My lacing letters are blocks. I really like these too. Where did you find the letters? I would use them for letter order given cards CD_ or M_O or _BC they would have to fill in the blank and of course string the written sequence. You could also use in a small group with onset and rime. Thanks for the post!
I purchased my “craft” boxes from Harbor Freight for $2.99! Try looking in the hardware section – sometimes they are cheaper! I LOVE your bead work! Thanks for the pipe cleaner idea!! I have a ton of pipe cleaners!
I know I’m WAY past 30, but I wanted to comment anyway. It’s almost like you read my mind when it comes to bead work! I just came across some frog counters that are actually beads and I was wondering if you had any self-correcting cards that I could use to incorporate them. I’ve been searching on TpT, but I don’t see anything like that. If you feel inspired, I’d love to have patterning cards to use in a math station. Another idea would be number cards that the child can show that many counters to match the number. They could incorporate different counters (bears, cars, frogs, etc.) and be used with or without beads. (My frog counters are the only ones I have that are actually beads, too.) “If you create it, I will purchase it”, lol!
I do love the alphabet beads and will be using those, as well! As always, thanks for sharing your brilliantly creative mind!!
I had to comment…way past 30, but I love how hands-on the bead activities are and following them up with writing and self correcting is brilliant! I would love to see some of the number beads added for math. You could do a what comes before, what comes after activity.
With nearly 20 years of experience as a full-time kindergarten teacher, I’m committed to creating a classroom where learning is joyful, engaging, challenging, and fun. Each day, I work to ensure that my students feel successful through instruction that considers their unique interests, learning profiles, and readiness levels. I believe that students should be excited to come to class and enjoy a myriad of hands-on activities that encourage exploration and discovery.
While I continue to teach full-time, I find so much joy in connecting and building friendships with teachers worldwide. It’s why I started this blog back in 2012. My hope has become a reality as I have been able to forge relationships with teachers, sharing ideas and building friendships beyond my little neck of the woods through professional development sessions and this blog.
So by all means, take some time to look around and explore A Differentiated Kindergarten. Gather some new ideas, fun tips, and most importantly, don’t forget to reach out and say, ‘Hi!’
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