Crayon Name Craft For Kids – A Fun Name Practice Activity
Try crayon name puzzles if you’re looking for fun and engaging name practice activities for your preschoolers! This adorable printable puzzle and crayon name craft for kids is easy to make, and you can use the name puzzles repeatedly with your kids.
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Importance of Name Practice Activities
We all know that young kids LOVE themselves. That’s why name activities for preschool kids are such a motivating way to introduce letters and sounds.
As a preschool teacher, you know how important it is for your students to learn to recognize and spell their names. Not only is this a foundational skill for future reading and writing success, but it also helps build self-esteem and a sense of belonging in the classroom.
There are lots of ways to practice students’ names in the preschool, pre-k, or kindergarten classroom, but one of my favorites is these printable crayon name puzzles! The crayon name craft for kids is super easy to customize!
Perfect for your literacy center, these crayon names are a fun way to help your kids learn letter recognition, learn to spell their names, learn to recognize their names, learn letter sounds and more.
How to Prep The Editable Name Puzzles
Easy to Customize
There is no need to feel overwhelmed when customizing these editable name practice crafts. The editable PDF is super simple to customize and comes with step-by-step directions. To avoid frustration, you need to make sure that you use Adobe Acrobat Reader (it’s free) on your laptop to open the document. Unfortunately, the Adobe Acrobat Reader app for phones and devices does not have the same capability as the one that you download on your laptop.
After opening the document in Adobe Acrobat Reader, you add the letters of your kids’ names to the Class Form in the document. When you add letters of your students’ names to the form, they are automatically added to the different pieces of the crayon templates.
See how easy it is to create a really fun learning opportunity for your kids?
Finally, you can print the puzzles for your kids. You can print on white standard printer paper and kids can add colors with crayons or markers, but they look gorgeous when printed on brightly colored paper. Want to make the activity even more exciting? Print the name puzzles on each child’s favorite color of paper.
The following are included in the Crayon Name Puzzle resource
- 2 styles of editable name puzzles for names with 2-12 letters
- Class List Forms – Complete the form and letters are automatically added to the puzzles
- Print Planner- Helps you determine which pages to print
- Printable labels- for storage containers
Two Different Puzzle Styles: Two styles of puzzles are included in the resource. One has black letters that look amazing when printed on brightly colored paper. This is the style I love to use for big, bold crayon name crafts for kids. The second style has outlined letters so that kids can color them with crayons….or use them for fun name-tracing activities.
Easy-to-Use Class List Form: You can make crayon name puzzles for kids with 2-12 letters in their names. If you have a child with a name longer than 12 letters, you can just add a few letters to another row of the class form to print the extra letters. Let me know, and I will help you figure it out.
You will need to use the most recent version of Adobe Acrobat Reader on your desktop or laptop (the app for devices just doesn’t seem to be the same) to add your kids’ names to my document. To customize your puzzles you just need to enter your kids’ names into the document’s class list form. Their names will be automatically added to the puzzles.
Print Planner Page: Consult the print planner page to quickly determine which pages to print.
Labels: When you print and cut the puzzles, you don’t want all of the pieces to get all mixed up. Store individual puzzles in envelopes, plastic bags, or all those little plastic containers you have been hoarding. The resource also includes labels that you can attach to your choice of storage. You can even use the cute little crayons as classroom labels.
Here’s another idea…..You can create a custom puzzle, add it to a nice envelope and you have a very inexpensive gift for your kids.
What Teachers are saying About the Crayon Name Craft For Kids?
Teachers who have used this resource are raving about it! Here is what they had to say after using it in their classroom:
How to Use the Crayon Name Puzzles
The name puzzles are great at the beginning of the year or any time of year. When you prep and use them as puzzles, you can use them over and over again. Use them as a sign-in activity or for morning work practice. Prep them for an open house activity, creating a great opportunity for kids to show off their name recognition and name spelling skills to their parents.
I also love using the puzzles as a simple crayon name craft activity. Provide a glue stick and some construction paper or sentence strips. Kids can glue the pieces of crayon down to the paper background, and you can use them as an easy way to make the cutest bulletin board display.
Alphabet Knowledge and Recognition
Name puzzles are a great way to work on important concepts like alphabet recognition. As kids work on their puzzles, here are some questions you can ask them about the letters.
- What letters do you see?
- What do you notice about the shape of the letters?
- Are there any duplicate letters?
- What sounds do you hear when I say the name?
- Which are uppercase letters and which are lowercase letters?
- Why do you think the letter at the front of a name is uppercase or capital?
- Do you and your friend have any of the same letters in your puzzles?
Letter Writing
They can practice letter formation by finger tracing each letter as they complete a puzzle or crayon name craft. They can also attempt to write the letters on a salt tray, in playdough, or on a separate piece of paper
Name Tracing
You can also use the crayons to work on fine motor skills like pre-writing skills and letter formation. Don’t you think these simple editable name crafts would be much more exciting than a letter tracing strip or name tracing worksheet? Make a name puzzle using the outlined letters (version 2) Kids can color or trace each letter in their names.
Get out the glitter glue for another fun name tracing and fine motor activity. Kids can squeeze glitter glue to trace the letters in their names.
Name Writing
More advanced students can use the letters on their puzzle pieces as guides to work on writing letters on separate pieces of paper.
Syllable Recognition
You can work on syllables by asking them to clap their name. How many claps are there in Sa-man-tha?
Create Rhymes
Have fun with the name and create a silly rhyme activity by changing the first letter of the name (Example…. Deena rhymes with Leena and Alex rhymes with Balex)
Complete a Friend’s Puzzle
In addition to working on spelling their own names, kids will enjoy putting their friends’ puzzles together. Does the friend have some of the same letters in his/her name as you have in yours?
Additional Ways to Use the Crayon Name Puzzles
These crayon name crafts for kids can be used in many different ways, in addition to name practice activities.
- Fine motor skills activities or scissor skills practice– Give those tiny muscles in their little hands a workout and let your kids cut out their own puzzle pieces.
- Color puzzles – Help you kids learn to spell the names of different colors. Instead of using letters of children’s names, you can easily print puzzles with the names of colors.
- Word puzzles – Looking for a great activity to learn sight words? Use the printable crayon template to create CVC word puzzles or sight word/high-interest word puzzles.
- Classroom Decor – The name crayons are a great way to let your kids create perfect decorations for bulletin boards, hallways, classroom walls, and doors.
- After School Activities – Use for a fun crayon craft for an after school program activity.
Purchase The Name Practice Puzzles Today
Want to get ready for the beginning of the school year and beyond? You can purchase the Editable Crayon Name Puzzles in my store. They are the perfect addition to your literacy toolbox.
Purchase the Crayon Name Puzzles and Craft Activity on TPT
Do you prefer to shop for your crayon name crafts for kids at Teachers Pay Teachers? You can also purchase the Crayon Name Puzzles in my TPT store.
Additional Name Puzzles
Here are some additional printable name puzzle ideas for you.