Write & Trace Wipe-Off Practice Placemats
While tracing worksheets can provide great practice tools for students learning to write, constantly making copies for continued use gets old and using up loads of paper (even in the name of education) can be wasteful. Allie, creator of the blog No Time for Flash Cards, recommends creating write and trace wipe-off practice placemats for your writing center.
Supplies You'll Need
- Sheets of paper towel (or paper will do!)
- Contact paper
- Markers
- Fun stickers and other decorative embellishments
Use the marker to create unique tracing sheets from the paper towel or paper. Cut strips of contact paper placing one on the front and one on the back, "sandwiching" the placemat between the two pieces of contact paper. Provide student with dry erase or washable markers and invite them to write, trace, and draw, on the contact paper surface then use a damp paper towel to wipe it off so another student can use the learning tool. The great thing about homemade practice mats is that they're fully customizable. Here are a few suggestions for writing and tracing practice:
- Create tracing sheets to learn the entire alphabet (both uppercase and lowercase letters).
- Create placemats to go along with learning units (e.g. transportation, vegetables, fruits, colors, animals, shapes, etc.) using relevant vocabulary words and themed decorations.
- Create individual letter tracing sheets. Incorporate both upper- and lowercase letters (e.g. "Aa", "Bb", etc.), relevant vocabulary words starting with the letter, and themed decorations.