Fun Phonics Games for Kids: Activities to Try at Home 

phonicsorg on February 28, 2024

Kids need to master basic phonics skills before they can become proficient readers. While practice with systematic phonics instruction in the classroom is necessary, many children learn best through play! To help you encourage your child to strengthen their literacy skills at home, here are some fun phonics games to try together.

Letter Recognition Activities

Letter recognition and letter sounds are the first skills children need to learn when entering phonics instruction. The alphabetic principle, or the ability to correlate letters with the sounds they make, is a crucial skill in reading and writing. 

Here are some games to help your child learn letter-sound recognition.

Letter Bingo

For letter bingo, make some bingo cards with uppercase letters, lowercase letters, and several objects in the squares. Get some tokens or small figurines your child can use to place on the bingo spaces they match with the item called.

How to play:

Give each player an alphabet bingo card. Choose a literate person to be the host of the game, calling out different letters, corresponding letter sounds, or objects with specific letter sounds. Players will use their tokens to mark off the matching letters on their bingo cards. The first person to fill out an entire row wins “Bingo!” and then gets to be the leader for the next round.

Alphabet Scavenger Hunt

Go on an adventurous treasure hunt with your child to find letters and letter sounds! To set up the game, create index cards with different uppercase and lowercase letters written on them. Secretly choose some small toys, treats, or everyday objects that match the sounds on the index cards. Hide the index card with the item that has its corresponding letter sound. For example, hide the letter <H> next to a helicopter toy, hairbrush, or hat. 

How to play: 

Explain the rules of the treasure hunt. Give your child clues and then have them search for prizes that match your clues. You might give a directional clue (“This treasure is near something wooden”), a letter clue (“This item starts with <B>”), or a letter sound clue (“Look for something that has the sound, /sh/”). If they find enough treasures, let them choose a prize.

Whack-a-Letter

This is a fun phonics game for beginner readers who love physical activities. You (or another family member or friend) will collect wooden or foam toy letters to arrange on the floor. Give players something to “whack” the letters with. A fly swatter, toy paddle, or plastic baseball bat will do. 

How to play:

Explain that you are going to spell out words on the floor with the toy letters. The child’s job is to whack a letter! When he or she knows the sound of a letter, they have to whack it and sound out the letter only one time. If they get the whole word correct, celebrate with a quick dance party or some other physical activity your child loves. Make it fun and exciting like a game of whack-a-mole. This game often results in laughs and lots of fun!

Games to Practice Blending and Segmenting 

Blending is the sounding out of letters to form full words. Segmenting is the breaking up of spoken words into their sounds. Both are important skills required for reading, writing, and lifelong learning.

Fishing for Phonics

Go phonics fishing with your kids using only a few household supplies. You’ll need:

  • Construction paper
  • Markers
  • Paper clips
  • Magnets
  • Craft string

Create a makeshift fishing rod by attaching a magnet to a string. Cut out paper fish and write graphemes of words on them (for example, /sh/ /i/ /p/ for ‘ship’). Choose words that are appropriate for your child’s skill level.

How to play:

Lay out the paper fish in no particular order. Explain to your child that they’ll “fish” for words you say to try to create the whole word. Call out a word and then pay attention to how your child “catches” the letter sounds to blend. Offer guidance and encouragement if they get stuck.

Carnival Blend Cups

This is a fun carnival-style game for kids learning consonant blends and digraphs. To set up the game, get a stack of plastic cups and a few ping-pong balls or coins. On each cup, use a permanent marker to write a consonant blend (/bl/, /tr/, /sm/, /gr/, etc.) or digraph (/sh/, /ch/, /ph/, /th/, etc.). Arrange the cups at random at a reasonable distance so your child can throw something into the opening. 

How to play:

You can sound out one of the blends of digraphs, such as /sh/ or /tr/. Alternatively, you can say a word that starts with that blend or digraph. Then, your child tries to toss the coin or ball into the correct “blend cup.” Switch it up as your child progresses their phonics skills and scramble whole word segments they have to find before the time runs out!

Sound Train

This game doesn’t require any materials—just your attention, imagination, and voice. It’s a fun way to strengthen phonological awareness, memory, and comprehension. 

How to play:

The goal of this game is to create a spoken sound train with your child. Take turns saying individual letter sounds and then coming up with another letter sound to add to it until you make a word. For example, you say /m/, your child says /i/, you say /s/, and your child says /t/. Then, your child tries to identify the whole word: ‘mist.’ You can make it more challenging after you create a train: see if your child can spell the word on a piece of paper. Get creative and try to see the longest word you can make together. 

Rhyming Games

Rhyming helps kids identify similarities in different words. It also strengthens listening skills, vocabulary, and phonemic awareness in early phonics instruction. Here are a few activities to try with a group or children or one-on-one.

Rhyme Relay Race

This is a great activity that gets kids working their bodies and minds at the same time. You don’t need any materials for this phonics game—just six or more players, a field to run, and positive attitudes.

How to play:

Separate players into teams of two or more. Have players spread out along the course in a designated relay order: the first person at the starting line, the second person farther ahead, and so on. Establish a finish line at the very end of the field. Explain that the relay race winners will be those who can think of rhymes that match your starting word.

Choose a starting word (let’s say it’s ‘craft’). Call out, “On your mark, get set, ‘craft!’” The first player at the starting line must think of a rhyming word. When they call out a correct rhyming word, they run up to their next relay teammate and tag them. That teammate calls out a different rhyming word and goes up to the next teammate, and so on. The first team to get to the finish line wins!

Two-of-a-Kind Rhymes

If your child is younger and you want to play a rhyming game one-on-one, “two of a kind” is easy and can be played anywhere.

How to play:

Say three words out loud, two of which rhyme and one that does not. For example, ‘sat,’ ‘snail,’ ‘mat.’ Have your child guess the two that rhyme. You can make it more challenging by adding words that have slightly similar sounds but aren’t technically rhymes, such as, ‘cow,’ ‘clown,’ and ‘rainbow.’ Use this as a fun learning experience, talking through why each pair of rhyming words go together and going over any mistakes. 

More Fun Phonics Games for Kids and Parents

Looking for more phonics games to play with your child at home? No matter what stage of phonics instruction your child is in, there are many activities to support his or her learning. Check out phonics.org for useful and fun phonics resources that work!

Methods of Effective Decoding in Reading

phonicsorg on February 8, 2024

When children are learning to read, they must be taught how to “sound out” letters and blend them together to form words. If you’re a parent or teacher, for example, you’ll likely hear your child put together the word ‘dog’, saying /d/ /o/ /g/ … “dog!”

This process is called decoding. 

Decoding is an important practice in reading development and one that is required for literacy. By definition, decoding is the translating of printed words into speech by sounding out each letter to form the word. 

Some children pick up decoding quickly and easily, whereas others struggle to decipher new words. It can be a frustrating phase for a child but it doesn’t have to be. 

To help your phonics students master this crucial skill in their literacy journey, here’s what you should know about effective decoding in reading.

Learning Effective Decoding Strategies 

Decoding is an aspect of systematic phonics instruction. To understand these strategies, children should already have some phonemic awareness skills, including the ability to blend individual sounds into words. 

1. Letter Sounds

While not an explicit decoding strategy in itself, learning the alphabet and letter sounds is the precursor to decoding. Children must be able to identify letters in print correctly and correlate the appropriate sounds to each letter. If a child struggles with early decoding methods, they may still need to develop their understanding of how letter sounds (phonemes) are represented by letters (graphemes). 

2. Simple to Complex 

Begin decoding instruction by teaching children to read simple words and then move to more complex words. For example, many reading programs begin with consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words like ‘cat’. Once the child can read these types of words with ease, they can start to practice decoding words with consonant blends like ‘sand’ or ‘blast’. 

Introducing a complex word like ‘giraffe’ or ‘yacht’ when a child is just learning to decode can be frustrating! Building decoding skills in a step-by-step way helps children strengthen their competence and confidence when learning to read. 

3. Blending 

To make sense of new words, children combine letter sounds to form the full word. This is called blending. As an example, when a child sees the word ‘map’ for the first time, they must identify the letter and sounds in the word and then put them together to read the word ‘map.’

There are multiple methods of phoneme blending. The easiest way to blend is called continuous blending, or connected phonation. This strategy works well with continuous sounds like /m/ that can be held or elongated. Continuous blending is where the sounds are blended together without stopping in between. For example, reading the word ‘moss’ may sound like ‘mmmmmmmmoooooooooosssssssssss’. The sounds can be repeated and sped up to read words. 

Blending is used in early reading but remains an important skill for life! It’s one of the most empowering skills in literacy development. Even through adulthood, readers use blending to decipher advanced, unfamiliar words and expand their vocabularies. 

4. Chunking 

Sometimes children come across familiar parts of a word with a new prefix or suffix. A child may know the word ‘want’ but come across the word ‘unwanted’ for the first time. They may recognize ‘want’ but then segment the sounds -un and -ed to then blend the whole word, ‘unwanted.’ 

As readers learn more advanced words that contain multiple syllables, this strategy—called chunking—can be used as a way to help decoding. Building a child’s understanding of affixes will support their ability to break a word into its smaller parts. It can be used to help them demonstrate spelling patterns, read longer words, and notice root words.

5. Syllable Splitting  

Also called syllabication, syllable splitting helps children read longer words when decoding. The word ‘definition’ can be a complex word to decode for the first time, so breaking it down into syllables may make it easier to pronounce and understand: de-fi-ni-tion, pronounced /de/ /fi/ /ni/ /shun/. 

Some children may need help with syllables in the decoding process. Using lines or symbols to split syllables can help a student visualize the correct pronunciation.

Strategies to Help Kids Practice Decoding 

Like all aspects of phonics instruction, decoding should be taught explicitly and systematically while still being approachable and engaging for students. 

To build the necessary decoding skills for a child, try to make it fun! Use games, activities, songs, and interactive stories to instill these important reading techniques. 

As a teacher or parent, model correct decoding strategies for your child or students and don’t hesitate to guide them when they get stuck. For a hands-on learning experience that supplements classroom instruction, use an educational phonics app that includes fun decoding exercises or games.

Common Decoding Challenges and Mistakes 

Every child learns to read at their own pace, so don’t worry if a student faces decoding challenges. It’s expected that they’ll make mistakes, especially during early reading. As reading skills grow, many children may struggle with irregular words, digraphs, or silent letters at first. 

Reading is a sophisticated skill that takes time, explicit instruction, effective practice, and lots of encouragement. Acknowledge your child’s struggles and strengths. Let them know it’s okay to mess up and try again. Remind them that they’re still learning and celebrate their dedication to getting better. 

If a student really struggles or falls behind in their decoding skills, you can seek insight from a phonics educator or reading specialist who uses proven instructional methods. There may be an underlying issue that needs to be addressed before the student can progress in their literacy development.

Resources to Teach Decoding Skills in Phonics Instruction 

When kids learn decoding in a systematic way, they build foundational literacy skills. Mastering these skills at each new level of reading is an exciting, empowering experience that every child deserves. 

Whether you’re helping your kindergartener practice decoding at home or teaching a class of third graders more advanced words, you need to know how to provide explicit instruction in decoding. There are helpful resources available that equip children to take the next necessary step toward becoming literate, lifelong students. 

To learn more educational tips for decoding, reading, and writing, explore the resources at phonics.org!

What is Phonics? An Introduction for Parents and Educators

phonicsorg on February 7, 2024

Anyone who can read and write in an alphabetical language has mastered an important set of skills. They know the connection between letters and the sounds each one represents. They can decipher letter and word combinations when reading and encode which sequence of letters to spell when writing. Understanding these letter-to-sound principles is one of the most important aspects of literacy; a precious ability of human communication.

If you’re reading this, congratulations! You’ve already mastered these skills in English. You likely learned them through phonics instruction, although you may not remember how. 

If you’re an educator or parent who’s helping a child learn to read, you might find yourself wondering: what is phonics? And how should I be teaching it? 

In this guide, we’ll refresh your memory and explore what phonics instruction is meant to be. 

Phonics and the Reading Pyramid

Phonics is one of the foundational pillars of the reading pyramid. Once children understand the sounds of their language and how to verbally manipulate words (phonemic awareness), they can gradually move up the pyramid. 

With continued instruction, they move up the pyramid to build fluency—the ability to read with ease, accuracy, and expression. As they grow in fluency, children build their vocabulary. Eventually, they develop all the essential reading skills and can experience reading comprehension with little adult guidance.


How Phonics Works 

Phonics instruction builds knowledge about letter-sound correlations in reading and writing. It is simply, “the relationship between speech and print” (Beck, 2006, p.16).  It is an umbrella term for several important skills children acquire through development and instruction.

Learning the Sounds of Language 

Phonemic awareness, or the ability to hear, recognize, and manipulate the different sounds in language, develops in a child’s early years of life. It sets the foundation for spoken language. 

The more that children develop and engage in literacy activities with family members, they develop pre-reading skills. They learn things like concepts of print, rhyming, several alphabetical letters, and more. Soon, they’ll be ready for phonics instruction to begin. 

The Alphabetic Principle

Before kindergarten, children typically start learning the alphabetic principle. This is the understanding that words are made of letters. It’s the concept and practice of connecting letters with their corresponding sounds (otherwise known as a “grapheme-phoneme correspondence” or GPC). Children often learn the alphabet song and know that the letters make certain sounds, like the letter <m> representing the sound /m/. With early phonics instruction, they gradually learn, for example, that the letters <ch> make the /ch/ sound as in ‘chocolate’ and /th/ is the beginning sound of the word, “thanks.”

Blending Letter Sounds to Form Words (Decoding)

The more grapheme-phoneme correspondences a child knows, the more they can practice blending. Phoneme blending is combining individual letter sounds in a word to read the whole word. This can also be called sounding out or decoding. During instruction, a child might come across a new word. The child can blend the sounds such as  /m/ /a/ /t/ to read the whole word, ‘mat’. 

Segmenting Words into Letters (Spelling/Encoding)

Inversely, children learn segmenting in phonics instruction, which is the opposite of blending. Kids learn early spelling techniques when they can spell their names, loved ones’ names, and simple words based on the individual sounds that make up a word. For example, if a child wants to spell ‘skip’ but doesn’t know how, they can gradually segment the word into its individual phonemes from start to finish: /s/ /k/ /i/ /p/.

Types of Phonics Instruction and Their Efficacy 

There are four different types of phonics. Any phonics instruction for early readers is better than no phonics instruction at all. However, some methods do have more efficacious results than others. 

Regardless of the approach in the type of phonics, instruction should be explicit and systematic. This means determining a pre-established sequence or “scope and sequence” to directly teach phonics concepts. In this way, children can start learning with easier concepts and slowly increase complexity in different stages. 

Synthetic Phonics

Synthetic phonics teaches the association of individual language sounds (phonemes) to alphabetical letters (graphemes). Then, learners are explicitly taught to “sound out” each letter and then blend the sounds to form the whole word. For example: the letter sounds /s/ /a/ /t/ are blended to decode the word ‘sat’. 

There is research-based evidence that synthetic phonics is the most efficacious type of phonics to use when teaching children to learn to read. Moore (2021) says, “It is sensible to employ an approach that makes the systematic instruction and revision of sound-spelling correspondences most comprehensible for both teachers and students. Synthetic phonics offers the simplest way to achieve this” (p. 24). 

Analogy Phonics

Analogy phonics is a top-down approach. This means the instruction starts with whole words instead of individual sounds. In analogy phonics, common “word families” or “rimes” are used to

learn words instead of blending individual letter sounds. It starts with a word a child already knows (sat), breaks them down into the onset and rime (s-at, c-at), and then introduces similar words in that pattern (mat, fat, rat, pat, etc.).

Analytic Phonics

Also known as implicit phonics, analytic phonics teaches kids to process a new word by “analyzing” its parts (phonograms) and relating them to previously learned words. For example, a child may know the words cat, sad, ran, and mat. When presented with the new word, rat, they must sift through what they know— c/at/ + m/at/ + /r/an— to conclude /r/ + –at is ‘rat’. 

An analytic phonics approach may not be effective for all children. Typically children perform better on reading and spelling with a synthetic phonics approach. 

Embedded Phonics

The embedded, or incidental, phonics method provides reading instruction using whole texts. It is based on a theory of reading instruction called “whole language.” Instead of teaching explicit, systematic phonics skills, it requires opportunistic learning through practices like sight words (the, it, and, was, etc.) and context clues (words, letters, or pictures that hint at meanings or other words in the sentence). 

Embedded phonics practices are often considered “real world” reading but can hinder a child’s decoding skills, which are essential for reading new words. Relying on context clues is considered a bad habit as it can stunt overall literacy development.

Phonics, Explained Simple Enough for a Child to Understand 

Reading is like a fun treasure hunt. You can explore all sorts of stories and ideas to find the golden nuggets you’re looking for, and sometimes, discover amazing prizes you never imagined. This treasure hunt happens in the world of words, where endless adventures of learning and imagination live. 

But when children first enter the world of words, they don’t know where to go. Everything looks squiggly and confusing because this world is made of secret codes. These secret codes are letters of the alphabet. 

The first adventure is to learn to crack the code, which is what phonics teaches. Every letter makes a special sound; many of them you already know how to speak. Every time you learn a new letter and the sounds it makes, you crack another piece of the code. 

As you learn more of these letters and their sounds, you’ll be able to decode words. Soon, the world of words will come to life and you’ll collect many treasures as you explore. With practice, you can enjoy new and exciting treasure hunts for life.

Resources to Help a Child Learn Phonics

There are countless phonics programs available today. But like the different phonics instruction methods, not all programs are the same or offer the best results.

To help you decide which phonics programs might help your child learn, phonics.org offers: 

  • Educational articles and guides: Gain a deeper understanding of phonics principles, teaching strategies, and best practices.
  • Phonics program reviews: Compare expert-reviewed assessments of popular phonics curricula to help you make an informed decision.
  • Fun phonics activities and games: Browse the top resources that make learning phonics fun and interactive.

Whether you’re teaching your child at home or a group of students in a classroom, there are affordable, effective phonics programs to help their learning process. Explore the resources at phonics.org to find the right one!

Have a phonics program or app you’d like us to review? Reach out to us at [email protected] to let us know.

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