The story behind Alphabet Learning: Hands-on resources for early years

Our story Joanna 30 Jul 2026

Upcycled PG Tips tea box filled with handmade mini-books alongside acorns, autumn leaves, handmade pompoms, and wooden blocks.

Where did it begin? Early influences

At home

I’ve always enjoyed making things (pompoms, following cross stitch patterns, baking) and being creative; I made teacups from torn newspaper using homemade (flour and water) glue and, once dry (the best bit), painting and decorating the set. I loved solving problems (puzzle books helped while away car journeys), playing games (Rainbow Towers, a favourite), drawing, reading, and small world play, especially the farm. We had a huge homemade wooden board which folded flat, painted with green fields, a road and a pond to put all of the animals on. Joy!

Old school toys

A bright, organised playroom featuring wooden toys, dollhouses, and a colourful felt alphabet garland on a light blue wall — My children's bedroom when they were small with the Fisherprice Play Family House for them to play with.

I still have my Fisher Price play family house (that folded too - such a great design!) and my brother showed me how to make Lego cars that fitted into the garage perfectly. I’d help him by finding the ‘two-a’ pieces of Lego, those little yellow nuggets in a mixed-box of white and black with primary reds and blues, so reflective of that time - I still love bold primary colours. I spent hours playing cars on the carpet-pattern-roads and loved that if you lifted the heavy, round, green (like grass) rug up a bit in the centre, when you let go it created long, dark tunnels under a hillside for the cars to drive deep into.

Outdoors

We did mandatory family walks, yet despite not always wanting to go (especially when it was cold) I liked being in the countryside, seeing wildlife and found the different shapes and colours of the leaves and flowers fascinating, I hope beech nuts and acorns will always feel like treasures. I spent pocket money on animal-posters to put on my bedroom wall, the red squirrel was a prized one and it was possible, then (if you were lucky) to see them at Dalby Forest but the posters were a sad reminder that they were in decline.

A child's study corner featuring an educational Red Squirrel poster, a white desk, and a pastel beanbag chair. — Red squirrel poster, love them.

On lighter nights after tea if I walked the dog (a lazy Labrador who I adored) with my Dad

A young woman lying down and warmly hugging a yellow Labrador Retriever indoors. — Holding Solly tightly as later in life he inevitably slowed right down.

he’d often talk about ideas for assemblies (he was a primary head) and how to make them interesting for the range of ages (including staff!) that he’d be addressing the next day. I liked that creative sound to his job, or (later-in-life-reflection) at least how he found a way to be creative in his job. I wanted to be able to do that myself one day.

A blank canvas

Despite his advice not to (long hours, stress) I followed my Dad’s footsteps and did a four year BEd (specialising in art) at teacher training college in Chester. I was among a handful who got to do one of the annual teaching practices down in London one year and when I graduated I got a job at that school, just off the Old Kent Road (like on the Monopoly board).

A silver vintage race car token resting on the Old Kent Road space on a Monopoly game board. — The Old Kent Road on an old Monopoly board. Along with Whitechapel Road I'm sure it was the cheapest property you could buy!

A state of the art library was unveiled in Peckham that year and for me it felt like there were possibilities ahead, I had my own classroom to decorate and I was excited to have a place to put the many things I loved to make but best of all for them to be used to help little people learn.

A plain, empty primary school classroom filled with grey and brown furniture, muted flooring, and blank display spaces. — My first classroom, left as I found it - a blank canvas for the next teacher.

The fact that this particular canvas was an empty shell on the first floor of a tower block building with an extra tall perimeter fence all around and felt a little prison-esque, only spurred me on.

The exterior of a multi-storey Victorian brick school building framed by bare tree branches behind a perimeter fence. — My first classroom was on the first floor, pictured here.

Pre-Twinkl (!) I set about making the best of it - to look and feel inviting to the thirty 5 and 6 year olds due to start with me that September - I felt fired up and sure that they deserved the best that I could give them.

Upcycling

I spent the summer holiday (and many after, by choice) making signs and labels for the drawers and furniture and created ‘zones’ using cardboard and tacky back (the joy of my own laminator came later!) I salvaged a tatty, old home corner heading for the skip to become a post office.

A classroom role-play post office storefront with a red door, white curtains, and brick-patterned panels. — Front of the Post Office, a little tatty still but making the best of it.

Inside the post office there was a lot to do...

A classroom roleplay post office counter filled with clearly labelled shelves, forms, leaflets, and writing stationery. — The all-important selection of different forms inside the post office.

A classroom post office service hatch surrounded by conversational prompts to support customer service roleplay. — Roleplay corner post office detail - the 'customer service' hatch with visual conversational prompts to help model the chat.

Two young pupils engaged in role-play at a classroom post office counter with educational speech prompts and forms to write on.. — Two pupils talking in role about what they need help with at the Post Office counter.

A classroom post office weighing area featuring balance scales, parcel props, a red postbox, and printed prompts. — Outside the Post Office - a weighing table to prepare and compare parcel sizes and weights.

Another time a pizza parlour...

A young child wearing a paper chef hat taking orders in a classroom pizza restaurant roleplay area. — Preparing the pizza order while the 'supervisor' oversees to ensure the work is to standard.

The dowdy classroom-shell instantly felt more inviting when I popped up my new IKEA tent for reading.

A bright yellow IKEA pop-up reading tent in a classroom, labelled Our Reading Tent with cushions inside. — A pop-up IKEA tent I bought to be our classroom 'Reading Tent'.

I created a ‘writing area’ which included three different sized PG tips boxes up-cycled to be holders of ‘mini-books’ with many options of pens and crayons to mark-make in them, in a bid to tempt reluctant writers to have a go. Writing can feel daunting but ‘scribbling’ on a ‘magic board’ which erases those tentative marks with a simple lever-lift proved to be too tempting not to try.

A colourful early years classroom writing area with labelled pots of pencils, stencils, letter paper, and a display board. — Writing area including three sizes of blank books to make inside upcycled PG tips boxes

Blackboards, whiteboards

Pre-white boards I made the best of my 'scrolling chalk blackboard' (which was an upgrade to a flat one!) and actually (ahem) felt quite fancy to have.

A scrolling blackboard with display items featuring an alphabet strip across the top, days of the week, colour words, and 'Word of the week' signs. — My (double) scrolling blackboard, space enough for writing on the left, maths on the right - fancy!

I made a 'felt-board' which could be used in an interactive way and for display. Wipe-clean (not interactive...yet!) whiteboards were soon introduced - the mighty 'wedge' was a real game-changer. But - the best part? Whiteboards were magnetic! More resources to make, so many classic rhymes and songs, Ten green bottles being just one. So, with the help of the school laminator (had to book using it in advance) and with some sticky magnetic tape I carried on making. Exciting times!

Two visual classroom counting displays showing ten green bottles in a row and twenty numbered pink apples. — Two interactive number resources for rhymes, counting, ordering and recognising numbers.

A classroom 'Our Literacy Area' reference board with information for phonics, days of the week, sentence rules, and handwriting prompts. — Helpful references on the Literacy board gave pupils somewhere to look to help stay on track when doing independent writing, including the correct orientation for lowercase alphabet letters (above).

Classroom display titled Our Numeracy Area packed with number lines, mathematical operation symbols, and visual vocabulary cards. — A number focused wall to refer to at any time to remember the order of numbers or the vocabulary for eg 'adding'.

Classroom experience

London classrooms

I learnt loads working in London schools and the career development there was excellent. I loved learning about behaviour and instinctively felt that being calm, clear and positive always helped the children I worked with. I made a zillion charts to keep things fair (register monitor, who gets to change the weather chart) and sticky-back Velcro became my new best thing.

A primary classroom display with a weekly weather chart, interactive date chart, and learning objective posters. — The lesson aims, daily weather chart and class helpers.

Ordering and matching pictures and words for Handa’s Surprise...

A classroom resource display based on the story Handa's Surprise, featuring handmade mini books, word cards, and a woven basket. — A Handa's Suprise table, displaying books the children made as well as the fruits and images of the animals to order and label.

or Pass the Jam Jim rhymes…all those brilliant and inspiring books with so much learning potential to be extracted from them.

A classroom display cut out like a jam jar with printed word cards for a rhyming activity. — Pass the jam, Jim Velcro pairs of rhyming words to explore independently..

During guided reading I wanted the independent groups quiet and focused - busy but engaged. Those ‘zones’ I’d organised really paid off and adding a set of alphabet rhymes with finger pointers to the reading tent (with extra cushions on the carpet), suddenly even the most word-shy learner wanted a turn. When no-one was looking it felt safe to give ‘pointing along’ a go, fun even!

Two young pupils in school uniform sitting cross-legged inside a yellow play tent, one reading a book and the other holding a reading pointer. — Two pupils reading inside the class Reading Tent, one holding a 'reading pointer' to touch each word as he reads.

Early years in Perth

Later I went travelling and of all the places I worked, a spot I most loved was in Perth, Western Australia. Como children was a bungalow on an ordinary street which had been lovingly transformed into a small day nursery which was in my mind an oasis for the preschool children that were lucky enough to go there. That setting was close to inspection at the time and senior staff were feeling stressed. I love organising and offered to sort a box of old photos (hundreds) into the different learning areas and created photo books (which became evidence) for the staff and children to look through any time to remember activities, validating what they had achieved and inspire them to keep on doing more. We added photos to the resource boxes so children could see what was in them and made sure they were a weight and at a height that children could access themselves. I felt these few small, child-centred tweaks made a difference and I remember saying to myself at the time that one day I would like a place like this of my own.

How making resources evolved

Sewing

Back in the UK, when I was pregnant with my first child I was doing supply work on Brick Lane in London in an Early Years part of a primary school which I felt right at home at. I started hand sewing at that time which I found really relaxing and began making resources, story props - starting with my favourite children's story - The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Handmade felt play food items representing the Saturday feast from The Very Hungry Caterpillar, alongside the book and a small caterpillar toy. — My first hand sewn story props of all the foods the Very Hungry Caterpillar ate on Saturday.

Alt text options Short option: Handmade felt props—including a butterfly, caterpillar, cocoon, and leaf—displayed alongside the picture book The Very Hungry Caterpillar. — Hand sewn green leaf, cocoon, tiny caterpillar finger puppet and beautiful butterfly.

That school mixed nursery and reception and I really enjoyed teaching phonics to small groups and using some of my hand sewn resources during story and rhyme sessions. I made SO many things (very carefully - all hand-stitched, no glue) that I opened a shop on Etsy.

Two rainbow themed hand sewn felt alphabet letters (A to Z), each paired with a small felt object matching its initial sound. — Two rainbow themed felt alphabets I sewed by hand as decorative banners to hang - the pair took three months to make.

Childminding

When I had my first child I really wanted to be with him but also felt it was important that I found something that I found fulfilling, something for me. I registered to childmind and in our tiny shoe-box flat I made zones (free-play, comfy reading corner and a creative area). We lived above a nursery which was only open mornings. I hoped that as my setting had been judged 'outstanding' by Ofsted they might deem me reliable enough to use their outside space in the afternoons (I only had three children) but they didn’t engage. But once they’d left each lunchtime we did get to enjoy watching a fox family which played in the grass and slept on top of their sheds in the afternoon sun and there were a lot of birds to spot from our first floor windows, I even added a feeder to the glass so we might see some birds closer-up.

Learning from nature

There are lots of parks in London and although two of the children in my care weren’t walking yet they could toddle to parks if pushing a wheeled trolley. Walking at that pace allows plenty of time to notice every tiny detail, snowdrops, ladybirds and snails, dandelion seeds floating by, there was literally learning at every step!

An adult hand holding a dandelion seed head up for two young children in striped jackets outdoors near a grassy field. — Taking a closer look at a dandelion seed head before the last seeds are blown away.

We went out in every season and whatever the weather. It didn’t take long to fill a push-along trolley with nature-finds which were wheeled home for our nature table. I knew there was value in nature but spending time with small children makes that even clearer. Taking things at a slow-pace like watching the ducks and squirrels (we even saw a kingfisher - in London!)

A young toddler stepping into a puddle filled with autumn leaves while pointing toward a grey squirrel nearby. — Splashing in puddles is always fun but seeing a squirrel up close is also very exciting.

Crunching leaves, collecting sticks, sycamore seeds - treasure after treasure!

High-angle view of a toddler in a red-and-white striped jacket holding up a large autumn leaf while holding an adult's hand. — A beautiful prized autumn leaf being carried home whilst forgetting that essential walking practise was being done with every (supported) step.

Online teaching

The now-four of us outgrew our tiny London flat but despite searching for a bigger home we couldn’t find one there and moved away, far, north. Covid came along and I transitioned from being an online tutor to an online teacher to two sisters, (for a year) who were due to start in reception and year one. The family planned to move to Greece and as I wasn't aware of anyone else with this type of arrangement I didn't have a model to follow but together their parents and I made it work and honestly it was excellent. They set up a fish eye camera in their playroom room and above each desk a camera for each sister giving me a birds eye view of what they were working on. I could see the details as needed as well as the wider room, which included a carpet area and I was visible on a large screen for them, easy to see and hear.

How it worked

I made some basic resources for display and learning and posted them off to the family before they left the UK.

A collection of educational learning resources laid out before posting, including alphabet and number flashcards, ladybird maths cards, a tub of buttons, and activity sheets. — The pack I made included a set of lowercase alphabet cards, a number line to 20, two sets of number fans, ladybird boards and buttons for counting, doubling and halving and lolly sticks with Velcro ends to make 2D shapes with.

Once they'd moved I'd email resources over, the parents would sort what was needed and the girls and I would work on them together. We played interactive games on screen which we found a way to both engage with. I could see their reading books (using a camera with a birds-eye view) so knew if their pointing finger was accurately using one to one correspondence as they read.

A screen view of an online reading session showing a child pointing at text in a children's book with animal illustrations. — My view when reading with one of the two sisters while the other is working on an independent task.

Or when working on a table top activity I could talk to and accurately guide, modelling as needed for them to see on my screen.

A computer screen showing an online maths lesson where a child orders and measures paper images of Russian dolls using colorful linking cubes. — One sister measures the height of each image using cubes, while the other sister compares the size of larger objects on the floor.

Traditional resources

Phonics and maths involved singing rhymes and songs, magnetic letters, doing puzzles, building towers and activities such as cutting, sticking, sorting and matching. This really got me focused on using quality materials suitable for online learning and I continued to build up my collection to help with this role and once that year ended, online tutoring again.

My ethos today

Hands on

I really value hands on learning, doing ‘to see’, to get that personal experience and then doing things again in many different ways to cement the learning. They may not be popular but I’ve found some learners actually enjoy the structure of a worksheet, in fact sometimes its the youngest sibling in a family wants that most - to emulate older members of their family and feel that they too are doing ‘very important work’. Which they are of course, they often just don’t know - the best sort of learning.

Value of handmade

I love creating resources that might spark imagination, things that are just that little bit different, unique and interesting for a little people to pause for a moment to take a closer look.

Interactive rabbit alphabet game featuring a rabbit face receiving a carrot card marked with the letter t into its mouth. — Posting lowercase alphabet carrots into the rabbit's mouth, each time matching the capital letter displayed.

I’ve found time and time again that ‘handmade’ items capture learners interest the most. It’s like they inherently know that someone took time and care to make it and when a new or precious item is introduced they have (in my experience) treated them with the pride and care of holding a golden egg.

Make-your-own

It takes time and effort to make stuff and time is precious, but children do seem to get this and in my opinion it is absolutely worth the time invested in making unique one off pieces which, if done over time (a career) builds up a unique and valuable treasured collection, reflecting a personal journey and physically becoming an educators ‘Aladdin's cave’ or 'goldmine' for those learners who might be lucky enough to glimpse inside the ‘teachers cupboard’.

Aim

I want the resources I create for Alphabet Learning to be clear, helpful, have value and are engaging. I’d love to know if they are or are not right in some way and welcome that communication from customers. I work hard to make sure each resource is as good as it can be and refine it until it s right, if it is still not right I will refine it again until it is! I hope the resources here are just that little bit different, interactive and unique helping learning be memorable and worthwhile.

What to expect from future blogs?

Through further blog posts I will write I hope to shine a spotlight on various resources already available on Alphabet Learning and bring into focus some maybe less-obvious qualities so that others can get the most out of using them. Ultimately I hope by dipping into blog posts like this I will be able to offer parents and educators something helpful to benefit their own learners in any type of setting, including right at home.