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Rhyming Day on Sesame street is a fun and funny way to expose children to rhyming words and sounds.

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Sesame Street: Rhyming Day | Waiter Grover

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Short video educating young students about CVC words through song. This is great for showing small groups. Jack Hartmann also has many other videos for young readers.

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CVC Words | Letter a | Consonant Vowel Consonant | Phonics Song | Jack Hartmann

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From the 2008 National Reading First Conference. Gives detailed information to teachers about phonemic awareness. Gives definitions, explanations, and ideas for teachers.

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Southeastern University: A Teachers Guide

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Southeastern University: A Teachers Guide

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Gives teachers ideas for getting kids interested in learning. This site gives ideas regarding reading based games, journaling ideas and more!

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Reading is an essential skill. Yet many students at all levels of education struggle with literacy and reading comprehension. That's why teachers are always working hard to improve their students' reading skills.

In fact, teachers can instill passion and enthusiasm for reading in their students. The following activities explore ways to approach reading in the classroom.

Reading Activities for Kids

Kid-Approved Books

One way to encourage children to read is to include them in selecting the books they are going to read. This will help them stay engaged with books and encourage them to explore new titles.

" Stories for young children should be of all kinds - folktales, funny tales, exciting tales, tales of the wondrous and stories that tell of everyday things," the U.S. Department of Education says in Reading Rockets. Finding books that produce excitement, humor or some other feeling is a top priority. "For children, reading must be equated with enjoying, imagining, wondering, and reacting with feeling. If not, we should not be surprised if they refuse to read."

Teachers can let students choose books that are read in the classroom (usually from an established list of recommendations based on age, grade level or reading level). Teachers can also promote and encourage students to look for books they can read at home, such as by visiting the library, asking family and friends for suggestions, and looking at book reviews in newspapers or online.

Creative Learning

Some of the best reading activities for kids involve ways to bring stories to life. Creative activities help make books more interactive and fun.

Teachers can explore using art to support ideas and concepts in books. Activities include looking at how illustrations relate to the book's content, drawing characters and scenes from the story, coloring pictures, etc. Students can perform these tasks to put a creative spin on what they are reading, which will improve comprehension.

Teachers can also help students notice and understand graphics as they read, such as maps and charts. The educational publishing company Scholastic offers a few ways to support graphical literacy.

Choose books with clear and persuasive graphics. When reading, discuss graphics and their meaning. Why did the illustrator choose this graphic device, and how does it add to the story?

Have students create graphics and plan for their purposeful use in their writing. Let students give and receive feedback on the clarity, accuracy and impact of their graphics.

Fill the walls of the classroom with a variety of graphics.

Journaling for Kids

Keeping a journal helps children record their thoughts, and encourages learning and sharing. By combing reading and writing, this activity builds skills in multiple areas of literacy.

Journaling can include recording students' school or home activities, such as making a new friend or how they felt on the first day of school. Students can come up with their own ideas for journaling, or start a weekend journal that captures how they spend their time away from school. Students who travel can be encouraged to keep a trip journal for vacations, or even everyday outings that includes pictures of daily events.

Teachers can encourage students to share certain parts of their journals when or where appropriate. Or, teachers can create assignments or activities based on the journal, such as asking students what the most difficult part of keeping a journal is or exercises that will help students organize their stories.

Reading-Based Games

Classroom games that exercise literacy skills can be a great way to motivate young readers. Education World offers a number of ideas from teachers.

Scavenger Hunt. Separate the class into teams and hand each team a copy of the same book. Have teams find the page numbers that show certain events, people or objects, and then reward the winning team.

Name That Book! After explaining the importance of a cover and title to a story, read a book to your students without sharing the title or showing them the cover. When you're finished, have the children draw what they think the cover should be and provide what they think the title should be. You can then display the cover surrounded by the children's covers.

Where in the World? Let students choose from a United States or a world map. When a student reads a book that relates to a state or country, the student may color that state or country on the map. Relationships to a state or country include birthplace, setting for the book, where the story begins or if the book describes the location.

Two Characters Meet. Have students write a story or play based on two characters from different books meeting each other. Members of the class can then act out the new story or play.

Please Stand Up! In this courtroom-style game, each defendant (only one of whom has read a certain book) takes turns being questioned individually, and the three jurors vote on who they feel has read the book. The judge then asks the real reader to "please stand up."

Cultivating a Love for Reading

Teachers play a significant role in how children approach reading and literacy. By finding ways to encourage children to enjoy reading, teachers can build a firm foundation of reading that will last a lifetime.

Southeastern University offers online education degrees that help teachers make a greater impact in students' lives and education. Programs such as the online Master of Education in Reading Education and the online Master of Education in Elementary Education focus on literacy skills. They take place in a flexible and convenient online learning environment.

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Reading Activities for Kids: A Teacher's Guide

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Reading is an essential skill. Yet many students at all levels of education struggle with literacy and reading comprehension. That's why teachers are always working hard to improve their students' reading skills. In fact, teachers can instill passion and enthusiasm for reading in their students.

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Online games, videos, and activities for young readers struggling with rhyming words and phonemic awareness.

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Learn about rhyming and play games with your favorite PBS KIDS characters like Super Why, Elmo, and WordGirl!

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Education.com provides teachers with lesson plans and ideas for many various subjects. A helpful resource to teachers new to working with ELL or ESL students.

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This site sells different games that teachers may use to effectively teach CVC. Great tool for instructors working with early readers.

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Cvc Word Game Teaching Resources | Teachers Pay Teachers

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Browse cvc word game resources on Teachers Pay Teachers, a marketplace trusted by millions of teachers for original educational resources.

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Teaching Phonemic Awareness and Consonant/vowel (CVC)

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Teaching Phonemic Awareness and Consonant/vowel (CVC)

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Provides a real example of teaching these skills to children.

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Short video demonstrating how to teach phonemic awareness to young children. Great for instructors to see an example to base their activities off of.

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Sound Blending: Helping children with Dyslexia. 

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Sound Blending: Helping children with Dyslexia. 

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This site provides game ideas to help early readers with phoneme blending. Aimed to help children with dyslexia. Gives game examples. Beneficial for any student struggling to master phonemic awareness skills.

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While many young learners can learn letter sounds, blending these sounds together can be difficult, especially for kids with dyslexia.

I'm teaching my 8th kindergartener this year. He also happens to my 7th child with dyslexia. We're using my favorite Orton-Gillingham-based reading program, All About Reading Level 1. (Read my complete review here.) So far my little guy is learning his sounds just fine but when it came to blending these sounds together, we hit a road block. I figured that if my family needed help in this area, yours may also so here we go.

What is blending?

Blending is the skill of joining individual speech sounds (phonemes) together to make a word. While many young learners can learn letter sounds, blending these sounds together can be difficult, especially for kids with dyslexia. Blending actually involves the use of phonemic awareness skills and needs to be explicitly taught as part of a research-based approach to teaching reading.

Why is blending important?

Blending is super important because being able to mentally join speech sounds together to make words helps students to decode unfamiliar words using letter-sound patterns when reading. Difficulties with the ability to blend is a hallmark sign of the struggling reader.

Why do some kids have difficulty blending sounds into words?

Kids who have difficulty blending phonemes (sounds) into words often are lacking in phonemic awareness skills. Blending also requires a student to hold the individual sounds in their mind as the word is created . This ability to hold sounds or syllables on a 'thinking counter space' is uses a student's active working memory. Kids with dyslexia often have poor working memory skills.

What to do if your child is having difficulty blending.

Difficulty blending sounds (phonemes) into words reflects a phonemic awareness weakness. Developing a child's phonemic awareness can be strengthened using some simple games. These can be incorporated into your daily teaching time with little effort.

How to Teach Blending to Early Readers
Blending Game
Say the word 'mom' slowly, holding each of the sounds for 1-2 seconds 'mmmmooooommmmm'.

Have your child:

listen to the sounds

blend them together in his/her head

determine the word

say the word out loud

Repeat this often using other words.
The 'Take Away" Game
The "take away" game is fun game in which kids take sounds away from words. An example is, "Say the word sun" (child repeats sun). "Now say it without the sss sound" (un) . . . say the word boy, now say it without the /b/ sound (oy)." You may have to help your child at first. As he or she gets better at this, you can have him or her take away blends (bl, tr) and eventually ending sounds.
Elkonin Boxes
Provide your child with a picture (e.g. a cat) and have them sound out the name while placing marbles, drawing marks, or tapping their fingers for each of the individual sounds in the word (e.g., /c/.../a/.../t/ is composed of 3 sounds, thus the child would use 3 marbles, marks, or taps.)

How to Support Your Child During Reading Instruction

The most effective reading instruction includes modeling followed by guided support. As you sit with your child, model the correct blending of a word. Start by saying the sounds slowly and continue to guide them by saying the sounds faster and faster until they are able to discern the word.
Tips for teaching blending:
Some letter sounds can be elongated and held continuously:
* a, e, f, i, l, m, n, o, r, s, u, v, w, y, z

Other letter sounds cannot be elongated or held continuously:
* b, c, d, g, h, j, k, p, q, t, x

If the sound can be held continuously, hold the sound for 1-2 seconds and blend it smoothly into the next sound in the word
* For example, for the word man, say "mmmmaaaannnn"

If the sound can not be held continuously, say the sound once, pause briefly for 1-2 seconds, and then say the next sound in the word elongating it for 1-2 seconds if possible
* For example, for the word pin, say "p [1 second pause] iiiinnnn"

It is easier to blend sounds that can be held continuously.
Start instruction with words that have continuous sounds
* For example, mom, run, van, sun

Gradually add words that have sounds that cannot be held continuously
* For example, dad, cat, dog, pop
Click here for a list of word families to use for phonemic awareness exercises.
Some students may benefit from visual supports when learning sound blending skills.
Point to the letters while saying each of the sounds slowly.

Say "rrrruuuunnnn" and point to the letters r, u, and n in sequence as each sound is said
The letters provide a visual support to help the student hold the sounds in memory.

Some students may benefit from kinesthetic supports when learning sound blending skills. Drive a small car over each letter (on a card on the table) while saying each sound slowly.

Resources for Teaching Phonemic Awareness, Blending and Segmenting

By practicing phonemic awareness skills and modeling blending skills, your early reader will soon be blending and decoding simple words. The following links lead to lots of fantastic, free activities that you can easily do at home to enhance your child's phonemic awareness and thus, their ability to blend sounds into words.
FREE Printable Phonemic Awareness Activities FREE Phonemic Awareness Activities TONS of Tips for Teaching Phonemic Awareness FREE Printable Phonemic Awareness Activities Huge List of Phonemic Awareness Activities
Have your kids had trouble blending? What solutions did you find?

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Teaching Blending to Early Readers | Homeschooling with Dyslexia

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While many young learners can learn letter sounds, blending these sounds together can be difficult, especially for kids with dyslexia. I'm teaching my 8th kindergartener this year. He also happens to my 7th child with dyslexia. We're using my favorite Orton-Gillingham-based reading program, All About Reading Level 1.

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Explanation of Phonemic Awareness and Game Ideas

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Explanation of Phonemic Awareness and Game Ideas

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This website describes phonemic awareness and its importance in developing language. Also provides helpful game ideas for students.

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Task Cards and Activities: How To..

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Last updated on July 13, 2021

These teacher task cards are the perfect phonemic awareness activities, right at your fingertips whenever you need them! There are cards for every skill and they are also differentiated for different levels!
This post contains affiliate links. By purchasing through this link, we get a small commission. Rest assured - we only share links to products that we know and love!
Phonemic awareness activities for kindergarten, first grade, and intervention! These teacher task cards will help you make the most of every classroom moment. Use them during small groups, whole group, one-on-one, in tutoring, or during class transitions to make sure that your students are building phonemic awareness every day!

Phonemic Awareness Teacher Task Cards

WHY PHONEMIC AWARENESS?

I remember my "Teaching Reading" professor in graduate school. She was passionate about phonemic awareness, and there were two things she drilled into our heads.

1. Phonemic awareness can be done in the dark.

2. Phonemic awareness is one of the best predictors of learning to read. (This makes it SUPER important!)

I'm also pretty sure she asked us to name these two facts at the beginning, middle, and end of every class session. In fact, she even made us order copies of reports from the National Reading Panel for "pleasure reading." But guess what? It's now seven years later, and I haven't forgotten about the importance of phonemic awareness.

As I teach reading intervention, I hear her voice in my head. (Note: I didn't say that I hear random voices in my head; I just remember her. ;) ) I'm constantly reminded of one thing: I need to give my students ample opportunities to learn and practice phonemic awareness skills on a daily basis. With only 20-30 minutes per session, I have to make the most of every minute. I could remember all of the skills in my head and keep track of who has already learned what, or I could create a program to keep me on track. Thus, Phonemic Awareness Teacher Task Cards were born!

These task cards are for the teacher only. Why? Because phonemic awareness can be done in the dark! Letters are not required in building phonemic awareness skills. (Save the letters for phonics.) Your students build phonemic awareness skills by listening and speaking. So for once, don't even worry about making copies for your students. These cards are just for you!

THE PHONEMIC AWARENESS ACTIVITIES

I took all of the phonemic awareness skills and created activities for them. They range from begining to advanced so that they can be used with kindergarteners, first graders, second graders, and any students struggling to read and write (spell).

Because phonemic awareness instruction should be systematic and explicit, I "scripted" each skill introduction and each set of student directions. That's right. All you have to do is read it aloud to your students! You'll also model a "sample" activity so that your students know just what to do (also scripted).

Ready for more? Turn the page (or card). You have multiple pages with 5-20 ways to practice that skill!

Skills range from "What's the first sound you hear in ___?" to phoneme deletion and manipulation. Don't worry. It's scaffolded all throughout so that your students will work up to the hard stuff!

SETTING IT UP - ONE AND DONE

Remember how only the teacher needs a set of these task cards? The setup is quick- do it once, and use it for years! If you have a paraprofessional, assistant, or parent volunteers, you can make them each a set too. They can also practice in small groups or one-on-one. I used colored cardstock and binder rings to keep all my task cards together. (Let's be real; it's also to make them pretty. 😉 ). [Note: These are affiliate links for your convenience.] I had many of you ask if I put the colored paper in a specific order, and the answer is no. I just randomly threw it in my printer. Since they print four to a page, the same skills will be the same color.

SKILL LEVELS

Last week, I decided to put all of the skills on one giant binder ring and use sticky tabs to track which groups are on which skills. However, if you want to divide the task cards by level, you can use the table of contents below to do so! [Note: This table of contents is clickable in the PDF, but it won't be here.]

Beginner: Beginning Sound Discrimination through Alliterations

Intermediate: Onset and Rime through Segmenting Phonemes

Advanced: Deleting With Compound Words through Ending Phoneme Substitution

I hope these phonemic awareness teacher task cards make as much of a difference in your classroom has they have in ours! May you hear voices in your head reminding you how important phonemic awareness is to your students. And also always remember that it can be done in the dark. 😉

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Phonemic Awareness Teacher Task Cards: Keep Me On Track

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Last updated on July 13, 2021 These teacher task cards are the perfect phonemic awareness activities, right at your fingertips whenever you need them! There are cards for every skill and they are also differentiated for different levels! This post contains affiliate links. By purchasing through this link, we get a small commission.

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Phonemic Awareness Activities. Reading Rockets.

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Phonemic Awareness Activities. Reading Rockets.

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How Now Brown Cow: Phonological Awareness Activities

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Phonemic awareness training is essential for students who are at risk for reading difficulties. This article describes the components of phonemic awareness and provides activities that special educators can use to provide this training to at risk students.