Teach your child to read by introducing phonics games and reading activities at home. Phonics plays an important role in teaching children to read. It helps children understand that certain letter combinations make specific sounds. Once children understand a specific phonics pattern (word family) they can identify new words that use that same word pattern. Practicing phonemic awareness at home helps children decode words and increases their word recognition, which ultimately increases their reading fluency.
Here are a few fun phonics activities and resources to try at home with your preschool, kindergarten, and first grade child.
1. Phonics Flip Book
Phonics flip books can be a fun way to teach sound and letter combinations. All you need is a wire-bound index card notebook, scissors, tape, and markers. You may design your flip book to practice three-letter words and sounds, blends, or word families. Word families help children identify common spellings and sounds in words. Tip: If your child only recognizes capital letters use capitals only. Incorporate lower case letters with uppercase letters when your child can identify them.
To make a blending flip book: 
- Divide and cut the notebook into three sections.
- Label the first, second, and last sections with letters A–Z. Place consonant letters in the beginning and end of the word and put a vowel in the middle.
- It is OK if your combinations don’t all make words. The purpose of this technique is to teach blending of sounds.
To make a word family flip book:
- Divide and cut the notebook into two sections.
- Label your first section with a blend such as: “fl, bl, cl, st, wh, ch, dr, or gr”
- Write your word family in the last section using patters like “at, ig, ake, ight, ing, ock, eep, or est.”
- Choose letters that form words with your word families.
2. Rhyming Phonics Game
Gather sets of rhyming objects to play the game “rhyme in a bag.” The objects should be small toys, stuffed animals or items you have around the house and in your toy bins. Place half in a paper bag and half on a table (pre-sort your objects so you have rhyming pairs in both places.) Have your child reach into the bag, pull out an object, and match it to an item on the table that rhymes. You can make it more advanced by adding word cards to pair with each object. Some examples of things you might find are:
- Pen, hen
- Sock, rock
- Cat, hat
- spoon, prune
- Rug, bug
- Glue, blue
- Tape, grape
Rhyming can help children understand that words that share common sounds often share common letters.
3. Phonics Hopscotch
Count word syllables with a hopscotch game. Using chalk or blue tape on carpet, outline the numbers 1–4 in the squares. Have children take turns counting out the syllables of a word using their feet. Understanding that words can be broken apart into syllables makes it easier for readers to decode as well as spell correctly.
4. Alphabet Hunt
An alphabet hunt is a fun and interactive way to teach letter and sound combinations. For beginning readers, matching objects with the same beginning and ending sounds reinforces this concept. Assign a letter of the week and have your child find objects in the house that have the same beginning sound as the weekly letter. If you use the letter C, have your child identify items that start with the hard “C” sound such as: couch, cushion, cat, carpet, calendar, clock, and candle. (The letter C can also make the soft “C” sound as in price and ice, but that is a lesson for first grade.) If your child chooses words that start with K, that is fine, too. This exercise is not about spelling words but about listening to the sounds they make.
5. Phonics 3 x 5 Card Games
Make your own phonics games with 3 x 5 cards (or post-its), markers, paper clips, and paper bags.
Spell It:
- Cut up a 3 x 5 card into 3 even squares. (You may also use post-it notes.)
- Pick a short three-letter word such as: cat, sat, bat, big, fig, pig, wig, rug, bug, hen, pen, men, mop, fox, box. Write one letter on each of the three squares. Give your child the pieces of the card with the letters mixed up.
- Have your child put the letters in order identifying the beginning, middle, and end sounds.
Tip: Work on words in the same word family such as the “at” family to help your child remember each letter pattern. Then, mix up word families so you pair “bat,” “rug,” and “mop” one right after the other. This will help you assess whether or not your child understands the “at,” “ug” and “op” word families. Clip your words together with paper clips and store them in a paper bag. (If you are using post-it notes you can stick the words together without the paper clips.)
Syllable Count:
- Using a 3 x 5 card, write a word with one, two, or three syllables such as goat, globe, snake, apple, dinosaur, lion, baby, balloon, pig, shoe, leaf, pajamas. (You may also draw or glue a picture of the word to the card to help your child learn the new word.)
- Label three paper bags with one syllable, two syllables, and three syllables.
- Pull out one of the words such as “goat” and read it with your child. Ask him or her to count the syllables in the word and put the card into the bag with the correct syllables. “Goat” is one syllable, so it should be placed into the bag labeled “1 syllable.”
- For a quick video lesson on syllables view this video from Scratch Garden.
Tip: Use clapping hands to teach your child syllable counts. Once your child has mastered these simple words you can make it harder with two-, three-, and four-syllable words such as tiger, flower, radio, calendar, tornado, potato, magazine, pencil, toothbrush, jacket, alligator and watermelon.
6. Phonics and Reading Activity Books
Include colorful phonics activity books, flashcards, and worksheets to reinforce your child’s learning.
Learn the alphabet with colorful activities, audio read-alouds and creative activities! Smart Start: Read and Write activity books for PreK-1 are a great way to introduce beginning reading activities.
Listen and Learn Alphabet
for grades PreK-1 includes fun alphabet activities to help children learn alphabet letters and sounds. The audio read-alouds on each page help pre-readers listen and follow along with activities.
Learning Line: Short Vowels: This resource is a great stepping stone for young children who have already learned their alphabet letters and sounds and are ready to work on blending.
Learning Line: Word Families: After your child can read simple words and sentences, you may begin to tackle short word families such as “ick” “ake,” and “own.”
Smart Start: Sight Words and High Frequency Words
for PreK-1 includes creative activities and audio read-alouds to help little learners practice and learn important sight words. Since many sight words and high-frequency words are not phonetic, children need repeated practice to recognize these words on sight.
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Heather Foudy is a certified elementary teacher with over 7 years’ experience as an educator and volunteer in the classroom. She enjoys creating lessons that are meaningful and creative for students. She is currently working for Evan-Moor’s marketing and communications team and enjoys building learning opportunities that are both meaningful and creative for students and teachers alike.
Connie Pillsbury graduated from the University of Redlands with a B.A. in English Literature and earned her Lifetime Credential through the University of Southern California (USC) Honors Intern program in Elementary Education. She has over 15 years of experience as an Elementary teacher and Resource Specialist. She is currently dedicating her time to teaching cursive to students of all ages through “Connie’s Cursive,” a community service program on the Central Coast of California.
Morning work has become the staple lesson plan in many elementary classrooms. The short, focused lessons help transition students into the classroom environment while giving them appropriate review and practice. Morning work should be purposeful, manageable, and relevant. It should enhance your classroom instruction and reinforce concepts and skills your students learn throughout the school year. With consistent spiral review, students retain their learning and perform better on state achievement tests.
Evan-Moor’s line of Dailies provides short daily lessons across the curriculum. Whether you are looking for cross-curricular morning work or subject-specific practice, discover the books that work best for your classroom with these practice and teaching dailies.
Many science concepts can be demonstrated using simple ingredients that you probably already have in your pantry. For example, pull out ingredients for a cake you want to make. Ask your child questions, such as Where do these ingredients come from? Many kids will know milk comes from cows, but where does flour come from? Have your child touch the ingredients and describe the texture: hard, soft, bumpy, squishy, etc.
Many people think technology is all about computers and the latest app. But technology also includes any manufactured tools, such as scissors, whisks, microwaves, pots, and spatulas. Pick up some tools in your kitchen and have your child guess what they are used for.
Kids love to play with their food, so let’s do more of what they enjoy! Give your child pretzels and marshmallows and have your child connect them to build different shapes. You can also use those same food items, along with toothpicks and gumdrops, to build a house for a small toy. Another fun activity to do with your child is stacking paper cups to build a large tower. This teaches children about construction, stability, and balance.
The kitchen seems like it was made for math! Children can build their math skills by sorting fruits and vegetable by color or shape. You can even open a bag of trail mix and have your child sort the ingredients. Other simple math activities in the kitchen include measuring ingredients for a recipe or counting the amount of plates and cups that need to be set on the table.
Tiffany Rivera graduated from Arizona State University with a B.S. in Family and Human Development and is currently studying for her Master’s degree in Elementary Education. She has over 10 years experience as a preschool teacher and has also taught elementary-high school English in South Korea. Tiffany is currently working for Evan-Moor’s editorial team, where she writes fun and engaging books for young children and classrooms.
Amy Michaels is a certified teacher with 11 years of elementary classroom experience who is actively homeschooling her own children. Her mission is share the best teaching methods and resources with all homeschoolers. Amy supports parents through her podcasts, webinars, and online training for homeschoolers on her website www.thrivehomeschooling.com
The most important thing to do those first few weeks back to school is to teach your students the rules and expectations for your classroom. Laying a strong foundation of classroom teamwork, respect, and understanding will pave the way for a productive and enjoyable year for everyone. See the reference articles at the end of this post for ideas and free printables.
Plan to incorporate simple activities such as ice breakers and creative writing opportunities into your classroom routines. Be explicit in your directions and model each expectation you have.
While you’re introducing your classroom routines, include some of these fun activities to get to know your students.
1. Who Am I Ice Breaker
Write down animal names on sticky notes. Each note should have one name on it. Tape one note to each student’s back without them seeing it. Have students work together to try and guess the animal they are wearing using yes or no questions. Other students will be able to read the card. (For non-readers, post an image with the word written underneath. This game shouldn’t take longer than 20 minutes.)
Check your work by explaining your reasoning. Does your answer make sense?
Heather Foudy is a certified elementary teacher with over 7 years’ experience as an educator and volunteer in the classroom. She enjoys creating lessons that are meaningful and creative for students. She is currently working for Evan-Moor’s marketing and communications team and enjoys building learning opportunities that are both meaningful and creative for students and teachers alike.
Amy Michaels is a certified teacher with 11 years of elementary classroom experience who is actively homeschooling her own children. Her mission is share the best teaching methods and resources with all homeschoolers. Amy supports parents through her podcasts, webinars, and online training for homeschoolers on her website www.thrivehomeschooling.com