Montessori Movable Alphabet

Ages 3-6. Designed for both parents and schools, this app beautifully provides children a way to "write" words in order to express themselves prior to mastering the use of pencil and paper! This is a preschool & kindergarten language activity that will help children learn the correct spelling of simple words.

We originally published this app back in 2011. After observing what others were doing with the Movable Alphabet, such as the Montessori Crosswords app, we wanted to create something that was more academic in nature vs. being more entertaining. So, we designed a very clean looking app that has a "manual" feel to it in order to closely resemble the physical Movable Alphabet material. Over the passed several years we've been thrilled to see schools systems incorporate our Movable Alphabet into their curriculums!

We're extremely excited about the new 3.0 update that came out in September! Many teachers and parents requested that we provide feedback to the child whether or not a word is spelled correctly. We wanted to do that, but in a way that still maintains the manual feel of the Movable Alphabet, without letters snapping into perfect positions. Well, after a lot of hard work, we've finally got something that has a great feel to it! Please watch the preview video to see how it works!

After learning to identify and blend the sounds of the letters of the alphabet children are often ready to build words on their own. However, the ability to write them down with paper and pencil may require much more time and practice to acquire. Therefore, Dr. Montessori prepared the Movable Alphabet for children to “write” words, long before mastering the physical skill of writing.

Children can phonetically sound out words, one letter at a time to build words. The app includes over 40 images of simple words, along with audio pronunciations and instructions, for children to practice with. Additional word sets are available, too!

To help the child construct the words correctly, they can touch the buttons in the box or the letters themselves to hear their sound, giving them the ability to "search" for the sound they are thinking of to build their word!

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About the Word Sets:

Once the children begin the process of composing three letter words (consonant-vowel-consonant) with the Movable Alphabet they are encouraged to move on to building four and five letter words. In our experience in the classroom, it is best to follow the CVC words with four letter, CVCC words, which often seems to be easier for the blending of sounds leading up to the actual reading of words. Mastering word building requires lots of practice and repetition. Following this, we introduce four letter, CCVC words and then five letter, CCVCC words. As the children master these skills they often explore the process all on their own and have fun expressing their own ideas using the Movable Alphabet!

Word Sets 1 & 2: CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant), three letter words (bat, fin, jug, etc.)

Word Set 3: CVCC (consonant-vowel-consonant-consonant), four letter words (fast, bulb, hand, etc.)

Coming soon: Word Set 4: CVCC (consonant-vowel-consonant-consonant), four letter words ending with “ck” or “nk” (sack, rink, tack, etc.)

Coming soon: Word Set 5: CCVC (consonant-consonant-vowel-consonant), four letter words (clap, flex, spot, etc.)

Coming soon: Word Set 6: CCVCC (consonant-consonant-vowel-consonant-consonant), five letter words (drink, twist, slept, etc.)

Dr. Montessori observed in her work with children that after working with the Movable Alphabet children experienced an “explosion in to reading!” Our goal is to bring a sampling of this excitement to a large audience via the Movable Alphabet on the iPad & iPhone!

Thanks for your support of our Preschool Language apps! We have an entire line of educational apps for toddlers, preschoolers, kindergartners, and elementary students! Please take a look: www.mobilemontessori.org