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This is a fun a interactive game that will help students to develop the basic phonemic awareness by having them practice saying sounds out loud. It also reads the sounds to them so that they can engage their auditory ability.

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Phonics is one of the best ways to help your child learn letter sounds and how letter combinations blend together to make words-so important as a reading foundation. Kids playfully practice short and long vowel sounds, blends and combination sounds, plus more. Engaging, colorful learning activities begin to spell S-U-C-C-E-S-S in school!

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Flash cards are a super, time-tested way to learn fundamentals, and these creative, interactive flash cards emphasize FUN by combining sound and motion! Quick, easy, and self-directed, flash cards prove virtually unbeatable for reinforcing skills and improving speed. Kids can quiz themselves, time themselves, challenge themselves, again and again!

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This is a fun and interactive way to help build phonemic skill. I like this game for two reasons it is both actively stimulating and it helps children to develop words. The idea of this game is to have children toss a coin into one of the cups with beginning letters on it. next the child will have to come up with a word that starts with those letters.

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Toss and Blend: A Carnival Game | Activity | Education.com

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This version of the carnival game where you try to toss chips into a cup, to win a fabulous prize, gives kids a boost in early writing and reading.

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This is a great video that will help children develop their Phonemic awareness. It is both interactive and visually pleasing. There are a number of activities that helps to keep the children involved and interested in the video.

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Phonics Course Level 1 | Learn Phonics For Kids | Alphabet Sounds | Phonics For Pre School

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This game is a great way to help children learn new words and helps them to learn how to spell them . This is a free game that can be downloaded off of Itunes

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★★★★★ A great game to help your kids learn new words and how they are spelled!

Endorsed by tens of thousands of satisfied parents, teachers, and kids the world over.

Little Stars - Word Wizard s a fun educational app for kids that helps kids discover and learn spelling. While your kids will enjoy playing this game, they will be learning new words, their spellings, and phonetic sounds.

WHY PARENTS AND TEACHERS LOVE THIS APP

✔ The app is super easy to customize so you and adjust everything to your liking
✔ You can turn individual topics ON or OFF and introduce them based on the player skills
✔ The app is super easy to use for kids of all ages and all abilities
✔ You can customize everything - record your own language or add your own items
✔ Two player mode makes learning even more fun for kids
✔ The achievement screen lets you see how your little one did at the end of each round
✔ Adaptive play mode automatically shows more of the content your toddler needs more practice with
✔ The app includes 7 unique ways to learn new words - everything is up to you

WHY KIDS WILL LOVE IT TOO

✔ Earning stickers and achievements is a lot of fun for kids
✔ They like to fly their rocket into space
✔ Engaging voice artist keeps kids engaged
✔ Kids love hearing everything in mommy's or daddy's voice
✔ Wrong answers do not interfere with gameplay

SUBJECTS INCLUDED

✔ Over 150 3 letter words
✔ CSV 'a' words (e.g. cat, hat, etc.)
✔ CVC 'e' words (e.g. bed, leg, etc.)
✔ CVC 'i' words (e.g. bib, big, etc.)
✔ CVC 'o' words (e.g. fox, box, etc.)
✔ CVC 'u' words (e.g. bug, rug, etc.)

LEARNING GAMES
✔ Reading with Flashcards - see the word + 4 images and find the right image
✔ Reading words only - hear the word and find the correct one out of 4
✔ First letter missing - see the word with the first letter missing and find the correct one out of four
✔ Last letter missing - see the word with the last letter missing and find the correct one out of four
✔ Phonics first letter - hear the word and correctly identify the first letter out of four
✔ Phonics last letter - hear the word and correctly identify the last letter out of four

Heroic Support
****************************************

Heroic Support is not just what we do. It's really what makes us, well, us. It's that drive to make a difference in your life - no matter how big or small. Really, it's our way of life because we want you to be our customer for a lifetime of fun and learning.

Have questions? We are here to help. Email us at support@alligatorapps.com

Good

My three year old son likes it but it could use more features. There is only one rewards page and they give out the rewards stickers quickly so it runs out of space right away. You can't put in a player name and keep the statistics. All that said, it is entertaining him for now, it is educational, there are no in game ads, and it's free. I'd pay for the options it needs though, this seems to have real potential.

Lacks some basic features

While playing, you can not go back to any other menu such as home or settings to change anything. You have to exit the app, close it, then it will start at the home screen.
It does a lot of basic three letter words well, but it would have been nice to have 4 letter words included as the kids get easily bored with the 3 letters.
There is a button called adaptive play, but it doesn't explain what it does.
Also, not real clear on how things are customized.

joyful

I like how the different ways that a child can choose the letter to finish the word. Last I like that a word is given and then they have to choose a picture to go with the word. The child not only learns how to spell the word and choose the correct letter to match the sound they are looking for to spell the word but they also learn the meaning of the word. Thank you for such a great app.

Information

Seller

Innovative Mobile Apps Ltd

Compatibility

Requires iOS 4.3 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

Copyright

© Alligator Apps

Family Sharing

With Family Sharing set up, up to six family members can use this app.

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‎★★★★★ A great game to help your kids learn new words and how they are spelled! Endorsed by tens of thousands of satisfied parents, teachers, and kids the world over. Little Stars - Word Wizard s a fun educational app for kids that helps kids discover and learn spelling.

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This a a fun and easy game to play. There are a few variations that you can do including playing bingo, or Ispy. You can either make your own cards or buy them for a very cheap price. There are 26 cards in all that correlate with each letter of the alphabet . Children can play various games while practicing saying and hearing the words of the pictures out loud.

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Hands-on playful learning activities by an Australian Early Childhood teacher and mum of three perfect for home or the classroom.

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This game helps students to practice reading a saying out loud rhyming words. It is a fun a interactive way to spark students interest and help them develop phonemic skills.

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Starfall has no advertising, does not collect personal information from children, does not sell any information, and uses cookies only for internal website management. By using this site, you agree to our use of cookies and updated Privacy Policy OK

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Starfall: Learn to Read with Phonics, Learn Mathematics

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Starfall has no advertising, does not collect personal information from children, does not sell any information, and uses cookies only for internal website management. By using this site, you agree to our use of cookies and updated Privacy Policy OK

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This is a fun a interactive game that helps children develop speaking and knowing beginning letter sounds. First there are pictures that are printed out . The teacher or parent goes over each picture with the child and says the word out loud. Next you set up a tic-tac-toe board big enough to fit the pictures in . Now the rules of the game are that you can only match pictures with same sounding beginning words. The first one to match a row wins.

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Picture cards are a must in early literacy learning. Using picture cards without displaying the letters or words that go with them is a fantastic way to build a child's ear to listen for sounds within words {known as phonemic awareness}, which prepares kids for reading AND writing success.

And there are SO many things you can do with picture cards. You can sort them by beginning sounds {we do this in every lesson of Reading the Alphabet}, listen for vowel or ending sounds, and much more, like I shared at Imagination Soup.

These past couple of weeks, MBug {age 4} and I used the Letter Sounds Picture Cards from our Updated & Expanded Reading the Alphabet curriculum and Letter Sounds Tic Tac Toe. It was a highly effective way to get her to listen for, match, and strategize with beginning letter sounds.
*This post contains affiliate links.

Prepare Letter Sounds Tic Tac Toe

To prepare this activity, print picture cards for two letters. If you have a child who is not completely solid in letter sounds, I would recommend picking two letters that are very different sounding and felt differently in the mouth. Letter sounds that are made in a similar place in the mouth (such as B and P) may be confusing to young learners. You can read more about that here. We have played this game twice now. One time with T/F pictures and one time with P/M pictures.

I also cut yarn into 4 equal pieces for our tic tac toe board. You could use painter's tape on your carpet, a dry erase board with a tic tac toe board or even use paper and pencil.

Before we played the game, we also went through all the pictures and sorted them by beginning sound. This was to ensure that she understood what each picture represented and what sound it started with.

The last thing we did to prepare was divide up the cards {one player taking the pictures that represented one letter sound and the other player taking the other set}. We set up our tic tac toe board with yarn.

Playing Letter Sounds Tic Tac Toe

The strategy of Letter Sounds Tic Tac Toe works exactly as original Tic Tac Toe. Instead of using X's and O's, you just use the picture cards {with each player using a set of picture cards}.

To reinforce the beginning letter sounds, we played so that each of us had to name the picture as we placed our picture cards on the grid. The game was highly effective in listening for and identifying beginning sounds because in order to use the strategy of the game {getting three in a row and blocking the other player}, each player had to rename objects and listen for beginning sounds again. She did VERY well with this. Better than I thought she would.

Her biggest brother {3rd grade} also played a couple of games with her after watching us play...and she actually beat him one time!

Find letter sound picture cards in this subscriber FREEBIE set. There are 6 picture cards for every letter of the alphabet, similar to those from Reading the Alphabet. Subscribe to This Reading Mama's Newsletter to receive these and MORE other subscriber freebies!

More Alphabet Activities:

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~Becky

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Picture cards are a must in early literacy learning. Using picture cards without displaying the letters or words that go with them is a fantastic way to build a child's ear to listen for sounds within words {known as phonemic awareness}, which prepares kids for reading AND writing success.

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Here is a great website that I found that has 5 great ideas for phonemic awareness activities. each activity is explained in detail on this web page.

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Learning to read can be quite an overwhelming task for small children. In fact, if you think about it, it's astounding that children are even capable of learning to read in such a short amount of time. However, before they begin to read print, they must have an adequate foundational understanding of how sounds in words work. That is where phonemic awareness comes into play.

What is phonemic awareness?

In easy-to-understand terms, phonemic awareness is the ability to identify, think about, and manipulate sounds in spoken speech. This is NOT the same as phonics. Phonemic awareness is actually a critical skill that is a precursor to reading letters. That's why phonemic awareness instruction should NEVER involve print. If you find yourself working with letters or printed words, then you have skipped a step and crossed the line into phonics. This is a very important point. Research tells us that it's essential to focus on phonemic awareness in the classroom before reading can begin. We want to ensure that children have a solid understanding of the sounds of speech before we start phonics instruction.

Nowadays, we are facing an added difficulty, though. In today's early-childhood classrooms, teachers are feeling an ever-increasing pressure to get their students reading. It is easy to lose sight of the developmental process and try to skip steps in order to get our kids reading books as soon as possible. There is just one problem: skipping steps is not going to work. Children's progress in reading will be limited if they haven't learned to think about the sounds in words.

As early childhood teachers, we need to remember that we can't skip past phonemic awareness skills. We can't just barge ahead in the hope that all of our students have arrived in our classroom complete with the full-blown skills of thinking about and manipulating sounds in their minds. On the other hand, we also can't afford to spend a lot of time doing phonemic-awareness instruction. I am happy to tell you the good news that we don't have to! Phonemic awareness instruction can and should be done in small pockets of time throughout the school day. In fact, oral language and phonemic awareness can often be taught and reinforced in as little as five to ten minutes per day.

Here are five quick, easy, and fun phonemic awareness activities that are perfect for the beginning of the school year in any early childhood classroom. Yes, you heard me correctly - that word was F-U-N. I know fun has become an undesirable notion in many schools today. But I assure you that these activities will be fun and that your students really will learn about our amazing language! I have also included activities that require little or no preparation - things you can do on the fly! Although these activities don't cover the full range of phonemic awareness skills needed to produce great readers, they are still fantastic activities to begin any school year!

Listening

The ability to listen closely is a key ingredient of phonemic awareness. This is the part of instruction that is skipped most often, because teachers assume that young children know how to listen. They may not! Furthermore, if they don't, they're not ignoring you. It's just that they don't understand what "listen closely" means. They have to be taught.

The Listening Game.

One of the first phonemic-awareness activities I do with my students, even as soon as the first day, is to bring their attention to noises. After lunch, we come back to the classroom and all the children lie quietly on the floor. It's not naptime, but it's a great time to unwind, which is important for young children. As we lie there quietly for five to ten minutes, we listen for sounds. We all stay perfectly still and quiet. We become "sound spotters." We don't use our eyes - we use our ears. There are always sounds and weird noises you can hear in a school building. We may hear the air conditioner, doors closing, teachers talking, stomachs growling. The possibilities are endless! Your part is to talk about the sounds you and the children hear. Use a little teacher enthusiasm and exaggeration to get the kids interested in this activity. The key phrase is, "Who can spot a sound with their ears?"

"Moo-Moo," Where Are You?

I love playing this game with my class. The kids have a ball, too. In fact, they simply think we are playing.

How to play: All the children sit in a circle. One child lies down in the middle of the circle and covers his or her eyes. The teacher chooses another child to go somewhere in the room and pretend to be a cow by making a "moo-moo" sound. The child in the middle of the circle - with eyes still covered - points in the direction of the animal sound. This game is great because it gets children to listen closely for sounds and for where the sounds are coming from. It also prepares their ears to listen more closely to sounds in words. When the child in the middle correctly identifies the sound and direction, he or she gets to go next and make a different animal sound.

Rhyming

Rhyming is such a great phonemic awareness activity! Most children easily grasp the concept of rhyme. Some need a little help, though. Using word-play with rhyming helps children notice that sounds in our language have meaning and follow certain patterns. Again, this is a precursor skill to seeing sound patterns reproduced in print - as a phonemic awareness practice, it is purely auditory.

The absolute best way to introduce rhyming to your students is by reading lots of fun rhyming books, poems, and songs. Act silly and have fun! The more fun you have with the rhymes, the more the kids will notice the rhymes and enjoy the activities. Exaggerate the silliness of the rhyme. The poem "Down By the Bay" and the book "Silly Sally" are perfect examples of how rhyme can be super fun!

In My Box

This game is great to use after your students have at least some understanding of how rhyming works. That means you have already read lots of rhyming books, poems, and songs and played with those rhyming words.

How to play: Get a small box and place some pictures in it with pairs of familiar words that rhyme (like box/socks, cat/hat, or chair/bear). Use enough pictures so that everyone in your class has a turn. Sit in a circle with your students. Start with a child you know is strong in rhyming. Hold the box and choose a picture. If the picture shows a cat, say "In my box, there's a cat". Call on him or her to come up with a rhyming word. The child might say, "In my box, there's a hat" (or some other rhyming word). After he or she answers with a rhyming word, hand him or her the box. Now he or she gets to choose a card and continue the play.

Syllables

Working with and noticing syllables within words is important, because it makes students aware of how words can be split up into smaller parts, according to their sounds. Our ultimate goal is to work on individual phonemes (vowels or consonants), but children must first learn the concept of "parts of words." It's easier for young children to start with larger parts of words and then work their way down to the smaller, discrete individual sounds of phonemes. We are building a bridge from hearing words to hearing phonemes.

Bippity Boppity Bumble Bee

This is such a fun game. You get the kids clapping out names, first. As they get used to the game, you can start using other words with more syllables.

How to play: Sit in a circle with your students. I have a little stuffed bee that the kids love to hold. You could also use a printable bumble bee. The teacher begins the chant and walks around to a child:

Teacher: "Bippity Boppity Bumble Bee, Will You Say Your Name For Me?"

The child responds, "Jennifer."

Teacher: " Let's all say it." And the class says her name out loud, while clapping once for each syllable.

Teacher: "Let's all whisper it." And the class whispers her name, while quiet-clapping the syllables again, once per syllable.

Teacher and class: "Bippity Boppity Bumble Bee, Thank You For Saying Your Name For Me!"

Repeat with another student and his/her name. As students become familiar with the game, you can allow students to take on the "teacher" role.

Old MacDonald

Here is another great game that you can use to give the students practice in listening to syllables and putting them together into words. It follows the pattern of the song, Old MacDonald. By the time I use this activity with my class, we have read and sung Old MacDonald hundreds of times, so the song is well-known to the students.

How to play: The teacher begins by telling the students they are going to learn a new game - it's a different version of Old MacDonald, and it's kind of a silly version. The teacher begins singing, "Old MacDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O. And on that farm he had a /ti/ /ger/, E-I-E-I-O". Of course, the kids think the introduction of the tiger is wildly funny, but notice what they have actually done: Without being told, they have mentally combined the syllables /ti/ and /ger/ to realize what the animal was! It's huge! Then I show the children a picture of a tiger and they feel proud that they figured out the animal - and they think it's too funny! Again it's lots of fun, and they really think we are just playing a game.

The most important thing to keep in mind as an early childhood teacher is that phonemic awareness can be such a fun time! It shouldn't be long drawn-out lessons. All you need is five-to-ten-minute pockets of time each day. Phonemic awareness activities are also great to use during transition times throughout the day. I often use the ten minutes before lunch, and sometimes during group restroom breaks, to practice and reinforce listening and oral language skills. And the payoff is big! If you give phonemic awareness the attention it deserves, your students will be richly rewarded when it's time for them to start reading!

So now you know some of my secrets - the teaching games I use myself! I've had success with them, so I'm sure that if you make them your own, not only will you have fun with them in your classroom, but your students, too, will have an easier time with reading and go further faster!

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5 Quick, Easy, and Fun Phonemic Awareness Activities

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Learning to read can be quite an overwhelming task for small children. In fact, if you think about it, it's astounding that children are even capable of learning to read in such a short amount of time. However, before they begin to read print, they must have an adequate foundational understanding of how sounds in words work.

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This is another great site that has a wide range of activities for students to work on their development. I

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Available on
Step-by-Step Learning Path

"Love the progressive activities! I don't have to take the time to search for activities for my 3-year-old, and my 5-year-old just follows along when she's playing by herself... So I know everyone's doing the right things for their ages!" -Crystal, mother of 3- and 5-year-old girls
computers, tablets, and smartphones!

The Reading Curriculum Includes:

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Phonics

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More than 450 books and beginning readers

Sentence structure

Parts of speech

ABCmouse.com's reading curriculum spans the entire range of early reading, from learning the names of each letter and the sounds they represent to being able to read books, starting with a few words on a page and gradually advancing to paragraphs.

The curriculum for first grade also includes writing and language skills, such as sentence structure and punctuation, parts of speech, and practice with writing genres.

ABCmouse.com's reading curriculum spans the entire range of early reading, from learning the names of each letter and the sounds they represent to being able to read books, starting with a few words on a page and gradually advancing to paragraphs.

The curriculum for first grade also includes writing and language skills, such as sentence structure and punctuation, parts of speech, and practice with writing genres.

The Math Curriculum Includes:

Recognizing and counting numbers 1-120

The base ten system

Place value

Addition and subtraction

Names and attributes of 2D and 3D shapes

Length, time, and money measurement

The Math Curriculum Includes:

Recognizing and counting numbers 1-120

The base ten system

Place value

Addition and subtraction

Names and attributes of 2D and 3D shapes

Length, time, and money measurement

ABCmouse.com teaches numbers, addition and subtraction, shapes, patterns, measurements, and more! Our games and creative activities make math fun while giving young learners the practice they need to build a strong foundation for success.

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Science and Social Studies

ABCmouse.com's science and social studies curriculum helps children understand the world they live in and inspires curiosity.

Science and Social Studies

ABCmouse.com's science and social studies curriculum helps children understand the world they live in and inspires curiosity.

The Art & Colors Curriculum Includes:

Primary and secondary colors

Shades of colors

Paint-by-number activities

Number and letter dot-to-dots

The Art & Colors Curriculum Includes:

Primary and secondary colors

Shades of colors

Paint-by-number activities

Number and letter dot-to-dots

ABCmouse.com's unique drawing and painting program gives children of all ages the opportunity to use lines, shapes, and colors to create original works of art. Games, books, paint-by-number activities, and puzzles teach children to name and use a variety of colors.

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Available on Step-by-Step Learning Path "Love the progressive activities! I don't have to take the time to search for activities for my 3-year-old, and my 5-year-old just follows along when she's playing by herself... So I know everyone's doing the right things for their ages!"

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This is a great activity that the students can go through different fun games that hep work on their literacy skills.

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ABCya! • ABCya! • Learning Games and Apps for Kids

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Educational games for grades PreK through 6 that will keep kids engaged and having fun. Topics include math, reading, typing, just-for-fun logic games… and more!

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Epic reads is an amazing source for accessing tons of children's books. All you have to do is create an account and then you have access to millions of children books.

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Instantly access over 40,000 of the best books & videos for kids on Epic