Kindergarten Language Arts
The Alphabet
Lesson 1
Welcome to Lesson 1 of Kindergarten Language Arts!
Watch this super fun video on the alphabet and try to sing along!
Lowercase Letters
Lowercase letters are all letters that do not begin a sentence and are not proper nouns. Lowercase letters are all other letters not in uppercase. They are the small letters.
English alphabet lowercase letters:
a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z
Examples of Lowercase Letters:
apple
banana
word
cat
fish
Uppercase Letters
Uppercase letters are also known as capital letters. In English, the first letter of every sentence is capitalized. They are the big letters.
English alphabet uppercase letters:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Examples of Uppercase Letters:
Mr. Jones
Ms. Edwards
Main Street
UNICEF
"Their names are Jake and Suzy"
When Do We Use Capital Letters?
Watch this video with Jack Hartmann to learn when to use Uppercase Letters. Then, click on the boxes below to review!
Let's Review! When do you use Capital Letters?
The Beginning of a Sentence
When starting a new sentence the first letter is always a capital letter.
Examples:
"Apples are my favorite fruit."
"The cow jumped over the moon."
"How are you?"
Capital I
The personal pronoun 'I' is always capitalized. (If you don't know what a personal pronoun is, don't worry! That will be covered in Lesson 2: Parts of Speech)
Examples:
"I love to read books!"
"I want to go to the museum."
"I am studying English."
Names, Places, and Holidays
Names, places, and holidays are proper nouns and are always capitalized.
Examples:
Peter
Mary
Christmas
Hanukkah
England
Acronyms
Acronyms are words formed from other letters to make a new word. However, you must use capital letters to let the reader know that those letters stand for something and are not a word alone.
Examples:
BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation)
UNICEF (United Nations International Children's Fund)
USA (United States of America)
Days of the Week and Months of the Year
Days of the week and months of the year are proper nouns and always use capital letters.
Examples:
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
Play this super fun game and practice your alphabet skills!
What are vowels?
The alphabet has 26 letters, but there are just 5 vowels! The 5 vowels are: "a", "e", "i", "o", "u" (and sometimes y can be a vowel). Vowels are sounds made with your mouth open. Y is a vowel when it's put together with another vowel like the word "monkey"
Examples:
open
elephant
apple
umbrella
What are consonants?
A consonant is any letter of the alphabet that is not a vowel. There are 21 consonants and they are: "b", "c", "d", "f", "g", "h", "j", "k", "l", "m", "n", "p", "q", "r", "s", "t", "v", "w", "x", "y", "z" (remember, y can sometimes be a vowel). Consonant sounds are made with your mouth closed.
Examples:
tree
lion
green