Making the Spider Letter Swatter
- The first thing you need to do to make the spider is to gather the materials. You will need a plastic lid a little larger than than swatter, a bug swatter, a pipe cleaner, two large wiggly eyes and a black plastic trash bag.
- I cut a four strips out of the plastic bag for the spider’s legs.
- The strips were the woven through the slits in the swatter. I tried to space the legs three rows apart.
- Two holes were placed in the plastic lid and a small section of the pipe cleaner was placed through the holes.
- The lid was then attached to the fly swatter by putting the ends of the pipe cleaner through to holes in the fly swatter in the same row. The end of the pipe cleaner were then twisted down to hold it in place.
- A rectangle the length of the head of the fly swatter was cut out of the bottom of the plastic bag. By cutting it at the bottom you have two rectangles attached in the middle.
- The plastic bag cutout was placed over the fly swatter with the creased area from the bottom of the bag at the top.
- The plastic bag needs to be pulled tight and secured at the base of the flapper or head of the fly swatter with a small section of the pipe cleaner. We just wrapped the pipe cleaner around and around a few times.
- Then attach the eyes to the spider’s head. You can place them any where on the head that you want to.
Alphabet Activity
When you have created your spider swatter, you are ready to play the alphabet game. We played a couple of versions of this game. The first was to say the letter and what sounds it can make. I stuck with the sounds you hear when you first say the letter sounds. (Some letters make more than one sound. I didn’t really get into that.)
The second version of the game called for saying a word that starts with that letter sound. We both took turns trying to come up with as many words as we could for each letter. I tried to stick with coming up with new words that JDaniel might not have heard before. It was an attempt to increase his vocabulary at the same time that we work on letter sounds.
The third version of the game was trying to come up with words that end with each of the letters. This was little bit of a challenge, but we were both up for a challenge.
Do You Have Other Spider Ideas?
We have talked about spiders a lot on this blog. We made a spider web trellis in our backyard. There was a spider web themed muffin tin lunch. A math game used rubber spiders and pumpkin seeds.
Book That You Could Read and Explore
Halloween Bugs: Halloween Bugs (David Carter’s Bugs)is a really special flap book. It is filled with little doors that creepy crawling bugs hide behind. My son loves to guess what is behind each door. I think younger children will be filled with excitement as each door is opened.
This is the kind of book that you might want to read is a fun voice. I love reading it that way.
You will find more early learning activities on my Early Learning Pinterest board.
This spider game is the cutest thing I have seen in a while. How fun! You could use it with sight words for older kiddos, too.
That’s so cute! Have any good Halloween activities for first graders?
I think the twins would enjoy this activity.
Combining games and education is always such a great method (in my idea but I do not have kids so I can’t say that is worth much lol!) xo
I like watching spiders make their web!
I like to watch them weave their webs – it makes for some beautiful photographs when the sun hits it just right. I think that’s just outside, though. If I see them inside, I’m not happy. Although we have taught my daughter that they do a lot of good in the world.
I did something like this with her preschool class last year, but I like this version much better!
I must admit to not being a great spider fan (the Aussie Spiders can be rather big or rather poisonous!) but I do like your spider letter swatter!
Wren x
Looks super cute and sounds like fun too. Win-win!
Cute idea!
Why do little boys love spiders so much? Mine were obsessed with them, especially at Halloween!
I could see this becoming a whole family favourite – it is hard to find something that will engage both my toddler and my teen! Swatting flies with giant spiders will appeal to both of them! Thanks for linking up with We Love Weekends
those are so cute… and it is a kind of spider i would not mind in the house 😉
This is so fun Deirdre. I agree, this could be used in so many other ways. What a fun way to practice letter sounds and recognition. Thank you for sharing on our page today!
Such a great idea! What a fun way to work on early literacy skills. 🙂 I’m featuring this on The Sunday Showcase this weekend. Thanks for linking up!
Looks like a fun activity! I love how you made more than one game out of it…keeps it interesting for the little ones!
What a fun activity for Halloween learning! I’ve featured you at this week’s Pinning for Play link party! Thanks for linking up with us.
What a fun game! Featured you at Mom’s Library this week!