Play the "Word Builder" Game

Welcome back to Read Not Guess. Today is a review day. We’ll practice blending some words and then show you how to play the "Word Builder" game with your kids.

Let’s get started.

Letter Quiz

We’ve worked through almost all the letters. Now let’s check for understanding. Ask your child to say the correct sounds as they point to the letters:

f

i

qu

u

n

d

Word Practice

Now 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:

qu i ll

qu ill

quill

And:

f o x

f ox

fox

By the end, make sure your child is reading the word "fox" quickly and cleanly. Have them keep practicing until they get it right. A couple more:

y et

yet

And:

w i ll

will

Now try this sequence:

a n d

and

And:

s t and

st and

stand

Sound Addition

It’s important for kids to hear how words change when you add, subtract, or change a letter. It helps them hear the individual sounds in words and understand that different sounds convey a different meaning.

Read your child the questions and see if they can come up with the answers:

Question: What word do you make when you add the “n” and the “ow” sounds?

Answer: n + ow = now

Question: What word do you make when you add the “h” and the “ow” sounds?

Answer: h + ow = how

Question: What word do you make when you add the “c” and the “ow” sounds?

Answer: c + ow = cow

What if you add an "s" sound at the end of "cow?"

Question: What word do you make when you add the “f” and the “un” sounds?

Answer: f + un = fun

Question: What word do you make when you add the “b” and the “un” sounds?

Answer: b + un = bun

Here's one last sequence to try:

Question: What word do you make when you add the “r” and the “ip” sounds?

Answer: r + ip = rip

Question: What word do you make when you add the “t” and the “rip” sounds?

Answer: t + rip = trip

If your child struggled with any of the words, go back and have them do it again. Repeated practice is good for kids.

For a harder challenge, swap roles. Have your child give you a word to guess based on a combination of sounds. Made-up words are fine! What's important here is for your child to hear the individual sounds and practice combining them together.

(Note that this is a game you can play anywhere. Try it at the dinner table, in the car, or anytime you’re waiting around.)

Word Builder Game

This game was submitted by a ReadNotGuess parent. She cut out small strips of paper and wrote letters on some and word families on others. It looked like this:

Either you or your child can pick a few sounds to focus on at a time.

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

To turn this into a game, spread out all the letters (and word families) on the table. Challenge your child to blend multiple sounds together into a word. For example, you might pick "r" and "an." If they can correctly sound out "ran," they get to take those sounds off the table and keep them in their pile.

Now it's their turn to give you a challenge. Don't worry if they're not real words--the goal at this point is to work on sounding out the letters, blending the sounds into words, and reading the words left to right.

If you correctly sound out the word your child gives you, take the sounds off the table and put them in your pile. (You may want to purposefully get some wrong to see if they can catch your mistakes.)

Play until the table is empty, and then see who has the biggest pile.

That’s it for this time!