Play the "Memory" Game with Letter Sounds

Welcome back to Read Not Guess. Today is a review day.

We’ll practice blending sounds we’ve learned so far and show you how to play the classic “memory” game with letters for your child to practice what they’re learning.

Word Practice

First we’re going to work on “blending” letter sounds into words. Your child can start slowly by saying each sound individually, but each time, they should try to say it just a bit faster.

Ask your child to say the correct sounds as they point to the letters:

o n

on

And:

z ip

zip

And:

z it

zit

And:

k it

kit

And:

l o g

l o g

log

And:

w i ll

w ill

will

And:

l u ck

l u ck

luck

Here's a couple harder ones to finish:

k ick

kick

And:

w ick

wick

Letter Memory

This weekend would be a great time to play the “Letter Memory” game with your child. It’s just like the classic “memory” game except with letters instead of pictures. You'll need at least one sheet of paper, scissors, and a pen or pencil.

You can do this with any number of letters, but let’s say you want your child to practice 8 letters. You’ll need to fold a piece of paper into 16 squares (see here if you want to see how it’s done) and cut out the squares.

Write one letter per square, and make sure it has a matching pair. You can pick any letters your child has struggled with, or I’ll recommend the letters: m, n, h, i, o, g, r, and e.

To start the game, lay out each of the slips of the paper with the letters facing down. The first person chooses two letters to flip over (and has to say the correct sound the letters make). If the letters match, the player gets to keep the pair and try for two more. If the letters do not match, they turn them back over and let the next person take their turn.

The game continues until all the letters have been correctly matched. The person with the most pairs wins.

That’s it for this week. See you next time!

P.S. We don't cover much handwriting in Read Not Guess, but a parent suggested this resource if you want to work on building your child's ability to write the letters. Download the one-pager below, pick a few letters to practice at a time, and then give your child a piece of paper to practice writing a few rows of each letter.

Letter Formation Guide.pdf

Download PDF • 100KB