Preschoolers love playing with mail. With this post office center you can teach them about mail service and work in some letter-recognition skills at the same time. You'll need several empty cereal boxes to start. If you want one box for each letter, you'll need 26 (consider asking for donations from parents). If you're okay with using one box for two letters, you'd only need 13 boxes. Cover each box with wrapping paper or butcher paper. Cut the tops out then line the boxes up on a long table. Be sure that the opening where the top was is facing out. If you're doing 13 boxes, cut seven 3- by 5-inch index cards in half and write the letter range (e.g., "A, B") on each card. Tape one card to each box (you'll have an index card left over). On several envelopes, write a letter of the alphabet. Students will deliver the "mail" pieces to the correct mailboxes. The person checking his or her mail gets to check to make sure the delivery person did it correctly (or you could be the person checking).
With this center, preschoolers will play the part of the postal worker stamping and delivering mail. They will also play as a parent or other person checking his mail. You'll need a table for your center, an empty box such as a cereal box and at least five real mail boxes (these are generally inexpensive at home improvement stores). You may want to wrap the cereal box in construction paper and then cut an opening as a mail slot in the top. Label the box "outgoing mail." Provide some laminated envelopes, so they can be wiped clean and reused, as well as a stamp and stamp pad. Line the real mail boxes up along the table and place the outgoing mailbox nearby. You could also provide a postal worker costume for this center. The postal worker can retrieve the envelopes from the outgoing box. Another child may stand behind the table making sure all mail gets stamped before it's "delivered" into the real mailboxes where other students will "check" their mail.
What better way to make sure important notes get home than to hand-deliver them to your students' mailboxes? This is a fun project little ones enjoy. They're bound to remind parents to check their mailboxes before leaving school each day. You can use real mailboxes (one per student) or have students bring in an empty shoe box. After you've explained how the postal service works, perhaps with activities and picture books, have your students decorate their mailboxes. Let them place the boxes in a corner titled "Mrs. Smith's Post Office." You can have "postal clerk" be one of your classroom-helper jobs. She will make sure important notes get delivered to each person's mailbox. Mailboxes can also serve to store student crafts, progress reports and any other take-home papers.