Letter Search

For this activity I had this foam alphabet puzzle that I got for 88 cents at Walmart:) and a dish of rice. I popped out all the letters and mixed them in with the rice. I set this up in the sensory tub so Caden already new the rules and everything would stay neat. Here is a picture of how I set this activity up.
We took it outside and started by asking Caden to pick a letter. Once he did I would ask him what the letter was and then tell him the sound. I would then start saying words that started with the letter. Then Caden would find where the letter goes and put it in the puzzle. It was easy to find the letters at first but towards the end he really had to dig and search. This kept his interest all the way through the alphabet and he still wanted to do more:)

Variations

For younger children who aren't working on letters you could put the pieces of any puzzle they have in the rice and have them search around for it.

For an older child you could tell them a letter to search for or just tell them the sound of the letter.

To keep an older child busy you could tell them to find all of the letters in order starting with A and put them in the puzzle.