This free printable is for both ant lovers and young children who are afraid of ants. It’s designed to make ants fun and focus on phonics skills at the same time. This free ant do-a-dot printable reinforces work on the short a letter sound. It’s an instant download, too!
Montessori-Inspired Printables at Living Montessori Now
My daughter, Christina (a former Montessori child), and I are partnering to bring you a series of Montessori-inspired printables. The printables are typically themed and use a number of Montessori principles (although you don’t need to be a Montessori teacher or homeschooler to use them):
- They use isolation of quality.
- They use photographs or realistic images to emphasize reality. Whenever I can, I’ll tell you the name of the object or animal featured. In the credits page of this printable, you’ll see that this is an odorous house ant, which you can introduce to your child.
- They typically use traditional Montessori colors such as red for consonants and blue for vowels.
- They use lowercase letters, which are what we introduce letter sounds with in Montessori education. (Children tend to pick up the uppercase letters without being introduced if they’re introduced to the lowercase letter sounds.)
- They often feature themed printable versions of Montessori materials.
Free Ant Do-a-Dot Printable for the Letter A
To download, click here and then click on the file image in the upper right corner of the PDF to save to your computer (just choose where you want it saved).
Montessori-Inspired Activities Using the Ant Do-a-Dot Printable
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links (at no cost to you).
Ant Do-a-Dot Letter A Tray with Power Magnets
Ant Do-a-Dot Activity with Power Magnets
Right now, I have this tray on our shelves for Zoey. This activity can be used on a magnetic board like the Melissa & Doug Magnetic Chalk/Dry Erase Board I used or even on a cookie sheet or the refrigerator.
This activity includes a variety of curriculum areas. It has phonics and writing (if appropriate for your child), math if you want to place the dots in a pattern (such as the ABAB pattern we used), and science with the magnets.
Having fun with Power Magnets and Ant Do-a-Dot Activity
Zoey loves half ball mini fridge magnets! (Of course, only use these magnets with a toddler if he or she is past the mouthing stage or is very closely supervised while using the magnets.)
You could add a tracing activity to the printable. If you laminate your printable, you can use an erasable crayon like the Melissa & Doug Learning Mat Crayons or Crayola Erasable Crayons. For a 2-year-old or other young preschooler who’s not ready to write letters, you can just leave off the crayons.
If you want to know how to introduce the letter sound for a, check out my post on how to teach letter sounds using Montessori principles.
Free Do-a-Dot Printables and Ideas for Using Them
I love the versatility of do-a-dot printables! If you’re doing a month-long theme, you could easily change out the type of do-a-dot activity weekly to add interest. Here are four ideas of hands-on activities for any of our do-a-dot printables from my frog do-a-dot printable post (see post for details and materials used).
Just click on an image to go to the post with the related free printable! Note: I’ve arranged the gallery in alphabetical order, although some posts have two do-a-dot printables and two different letters. Also, I don’t introduce letters in alphabetical order. You can find out the order in which I introduce letter sounds here. I deviate from that order for our unit studies, though, and focus on a letter that’s simply related to our unit. That’s in addition to our other letter work.
You can see all our free do-a-dot printables with the latest at the top here.
Learn more about my eBook Montessori at Home or School: How to. Teach Grace and Courtesy!
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These are so cute! My kids would love them! Thank you for the printables. I love the power magnets. I might have to look into getting some of those!
Thanks so much for your sweet comment, Lydia! The Power Magnets are lots of fun. My granddaughter loves them, and they’re useful for many activities. 🙂 Deb