THE ALPHABET

Imagine if, in two minutes, you could start a game that trains children's early language comprehension. A game that captivates children, is fun and
at the same time prepares them for school. Because, in reality, is there anything more satisfying than watching a group of children laugh
and play without realizing that they are actually learning basic language skills?

This is exactly the kind of game we offer. In collaboration with experts in children's early language comprehension, we have developed this package that makes
language learning a game with a construction set that can create numbers, letters, shapes, and figures. Along with the construction set, you get four inspiration sheets with activities developed by Sprogklar. When children play with this set, they practice language while activating many other senses.

EARLY LITERACY IN DAYCARE

Let's make one thing clear right away: Children do not need to learn to read in kindergarten. Nevertheless, this is where children take their first tentative
steps in their reading journey.
Learning to read is not easy. But through playful engagement with letters, children can train skills early on that prepare them for the "learn-to-read" project. We
call this early literacy, and it is precisely what you encounter in language screening materials, among other things. Early literacy includes:

1. Print concepts:
   What is print? What is it used for? How do texts and books work? All of this needs to be understood before we can learn to read.
2. Letter knowledge:
   Knowledge of the names of letters and understanding of the alphabetic principle. Let's look at the letter M. The shape is M, the name is "em" and the sound is "mmm" as in "mom". When reading, one must "translate" the letters into their sound and not into their name.
3. Phonological awareness:
   This is where children practice understanding when words rhyme and what sound a word starts with. It also involves the ability to manipulate speech sounds, for example, if you remove the "s" from the word "stop," the new sound is "top."
4. Ability to write letters and/or one's own name.
5. General linguistic competencies:
   The sum of the child's language competencies, including vocabulary and grammar.

It is the combination of these aspects that largely makes the child ready to read in school. Therefore, these are also the areas of focus in the accompanying activities. It is an easy tool that you, as an educational staff member in a kindergarten, can use in everyday life to work with children's early literacy.

EARLY LITERACY AND ZPIIEL

Play and learn
A fantastic way to become familiar with literacy and develop strong literacy skills is through play. Children are naturally
very curious about letters and written language, and by responding to children's own initiatives, adults can go a long way.
The Zpiiel letter blocks can be used in both child-initiated play and planned educational play activities.

Many senses in play
With the Zpiiel letters, many senses come into play: Children can touch, see, and manipulate the letters, and when adults join in
the play, the auditory part is also added, e.g., the name of a given letter and its speech sound.
Precisely because the letters can be manipulated, they are good for training phonological awareness. If children, for example, need to figure out what is
left of the word "claw" if you remove /k/, it can be quite abstract and difficult if they only have the auditory to go by. But by physically
removing the "k" letter, it is easier for the children to understand and see that only "law" is left. In this way, they gain an understanding that
letters and speech sounds function somewhat like small building blocks that can be put together in different ways and divided into smaller parts.
That children can hold the letters in their hands is particularly good for children who learn best by feeling and touching. With the Zpiiel blocks, they
can not only see the letters, but also tactilely sense what the shapes of the letters are like.

Only imagination sets the limits
You build the letters yourselves with the elements from the construction set and can involve the children here too. The elements have ball joints, which makes
it easy to change the shape of the letters. Zpiiel also allows you to build the entire alphabet with both small and large letters. Many
activities often only include capital letters, even though most of the letters children will encounter in their daily lives are actually lowercase.
In the activity catalog, you can find inspiration for a range of games with Zpiiel blocks that support the development of the
individual aspects of early literacy in various ways – but only imagination sets the limits, the possibilities are endless.