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Reading · Pre-K Reading

Chapter 1: Writing the Alphabet

Letters with a Line and a Curve

B D P R J U — a straight back with a round front.

Lesson
5
Time
About 9 minutes
0 of 7 done
Part 1 of 4Let's Learn

Step 1: Let's Learn

Read it, or press Listen and follow the words.

These letters have a straight line and a curve.

The line comes first

Draw the line down. Then hang the round part on it.

Step 2: Your Turn

Practice makes it stick.

Trace the Last Letters

The line always comes first. Watch the numbers.

Line down first, then the curve.

B

Step 3: Quick Check

Show what you know.

Question 1 of 6

Which letter is a line with two round parts?

Question 2 of 6

Which letter is a straight back with two bumps?

Question 3 of 6

Which letter is a straight back with one big curve?

Question 4 of 6

Which letter is a P with a leg?

Question 5 of 6

Which letter is a curve like a smile?

Question 6 of 6

Which letter has its curve only at the top?

What You Learned

  • The straight line comes first.
  • Then the curve hangs off it.
For the grown-up

B, D, P and R open with an identical downstroke, which is the point of teaching them together: one movement they already have, then a different ending each time.

This grouping is also the defense against b and d reversals later. The letters are distinguished by how they are written rather than by which way they face, and a child who has the movement does not have to remember a direction.

That is the alphabet. Twenty-six capitals in five sittings, and none of them needed a worked example — the stroke drawing itself does what a paragraph could not.