A fun word-building game for 2.5 - 3 yr olds

In my previous post I have written about making your own flashcards. Once you have your first set of flashcards, you can start building words. Start off saying," This is aa (phonetically-remember we don’t call it by the alphabet name, the first rule is to call the word by its phonetic sound). And this is tuh(for T). So when we put the two together (do that), aa and tuh, it is at. Now we keep 'at' constant, and add different letters in front" .At this point you can build different words...bat, cat, sat, rat, fat. Make bat and say," We add buh to at and we get bat. Do this for all the other words too. 

This tells the child the logic behind building words. Play with this method. Now, keep the first 2 letters the same and change the last. bat, bad, ban, bag etc. Make this a game where, at first you build words together, once your child gets the hang of this, you build words and help him read them out. Later, let the child build the words, however nonsensical they are, you read them phonetically. At this point we are trying to teach the child the logic of reading. Children love this. 

Now that you and your child have got the hang of it, make similar set of flashcards for other vowels too. 

I know I tend to repeat this, but let this be, a game and enjoyable. You will cause more harm than good, if you do not stop when your child is done. Children have a small attention span. Slowly build on it. But take cues from them. Do not bore them, they will not learn.


In the next post we will talk about introducing sight words and vowel pairs. Sight words and phonics go hand in hand for overall easy reading. The words that bind, phonetic words together to form sentences are sight words, e.g. the, and, so etc. Learning some sight words simultaneously will help the kids read easy sentences.

Post comments down, if you have any doubts.