Preparing your lessons to include word play is the second of our five elements of teaching phoneme awareness effectively. Word play in this case means using simple games to give students many different, relaxed ways to practice working with phonemes.

Which Word Play Activity Works Best?

Effective word play mixes fun with clear teaching on phonemes. For an example, watch the model teaching video below of teacher DeAngela Huggins using word play with her students. She's playing the activity called Mystery Word (opens in new window) to help students practice phoneme blending.

Video thumbnail for Blending Phonemes with DeAngela Huggins — Produced by Reading Universe, a partnership of WETA, Barksdale Reading Institute, and First Book

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DeAngela Huggins: All right. The first listening game that we're going to do is mystery word. Okay. I'm going to give you the sounds, and on my signal, which is going to be a thumbs up, you are going to put those sounds together and tell me my mystery word. So, for example, if I said /c/, /ӑ/, /t/ ... what's my mystery word? Cat would be my mystery word.

So you guys ready? Yes. All right. So first mystery word is /b/, /r/, ...

Students

/b/, /r/, ... bar.

Ms. Huggins: Very good. /C/, /r/ ...

Students: Car.

Ms. Huggins: Oh, this is a tricky one. /Sh/, /r/, /p/ ...

Students: Sharp.

Ms. Huggins: Very good. Yes. The next one ... /f/, /or/ ...

Students: Four.

Ms. Huggins: Very good. /M/, /or/ ...

Students: More.

Ms. Huggins: And last mystery word is /p/, /or/, /ch/ ...

Students: Porch.

Ms. Huggins: Good job. You guys are really good.

Narrator: For more information, please visit reading universe.org. Special thanks to Burgess Peterson Academy and Atlanta Public Schools. Reading Universe is made possible by generous support from Jim and Donna Barksdale, the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, and two anonymous donors. Reading Universe is a service of WETA, Washington, DC, the Barksdale Reading Institute, and First Book.

DeAngela Huggins: This is Reading Universe.

As you watch, think about these questions:

What instructions does Ms. Huggins give to her students for playing the mystery word game?
How does Ms. Huggins keep her students focused on learning phonemes in the game?
What word play games have you played with your students to help build their phoneme awareness?

You may want to watch the above video more than once. Think about your students and your instruction as you do.

There are many ways to use word play to review and practice phonemes with your students. Watch and learn about three different games that are both fun and have clear teaching on phonemes. (Click here to find 10 additional activities (opens in new window).)

Three Word Play Games

1. Picture Clues – Phoneme Identification

This game uses illustrations or photographs to isolate phonemes.

How to Play

Show students two pictures — one with the target phoneme and one without. Ask students to pick the image where the word for that image includes the target phoneme.

For example, show a picture of a house and a bike. Ask students to name the picture that begins with /b/.

In this video, reading coach Susan Robison shows us how! She uses pictures to teach her students how to recognize words with the same ending sound (phoneme).

Video thumbnail for Recognizing Phonemes with Susan Robison — Produced by Reading Universe, a partnership of WETA, Barksdale Reading Institute, and First Book

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Susan Robison: Now what we're going to do is we are going to actually sort our pictures by ending sound. This is a picture of a mouse.

Students: Mouse.

Susan Robison: A mouse, right? And the ending sound for mouse is /ssss/, so I'm going to have my mouse as my /ssss/ ending sound. Okay. Can you find a picture in your mind, right, that ends with the same sound as mouse. So we have ... [Teacher shows pictures and students point at each and say name of each picture.]

Students: Soap, toothbrush, harp, cactus, horse.

Susan Robison: Who would like to raise their hand and tell me another picture that has the same ending sound.

Student: Horse.

Susan Robison: Horse. What's the ending sound?

Students: /ssss/

Susan Robison: Beautiful job. Here's a picture of soap. What's the ending sound, everybody?

Students: /sss/

Susan Robison: The ending sound for soap ...

Students: /p/

Susan Robison: Yes, /p/, the ending sound for soap. /Soooo/, /p/. There we go. That's going to be another picture for .... hmm, we need to find, find a picture that ends with that same sound. We have [Teacher points to pictures, and teacher and students all recite the words.] toothbrush, harp, cactus. What do you think? What do you think?

Student: Harp.

Susan Robison: Harp. What's the ending sound? The ending sound. So we know it's harp. What's the ending sound? Har- ...

Students: /p/

Susan Robison: Yes. Oh my goodness. You did a beautiful job today producing your ending sounds. And this is going to help you with your reading and your writing, because we always have to hear the final sounds in words. Great job.

Narrator: For more information, please visit ReadingUniverse.org. Special thanks to Literacy How, Stillmeadow Elementary School, and Stamford Public Schools in Stamford, Connecticut. Reading Universe is made possible by generous support from Jim and Donna Barksdale, the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, and two anonymous donors. Reading Universe is a service of WETA, Washington, D.C., the Barksdale Reading Institute, and First Book.

Susan Robison: This is Reading Universe.

2. Elkonin Sound Boxes – Phoneme Segmentation

Elkonin boxes, also known as sound boxes, are used to help students build phoneme awareness. Each square or box represents a phoneme, or sound. This multisensory activity helps to improve students' phoneme segmenting abilities.

How to Play

Give each student a set of tokens and a small grid of squares, Elkonin boxes, on a piece of paper. Make sure you have enough squares for the phonemes you'll be using. You will say a word (cat). Students say each sound in the word while pushing a token into a box to represent each sound (/c/, /ă/, /t/).

For example, might say:

The word is cat, /c/, /ă/, /t/.

Students say:

Cat.

While moving a small counter into the first square of the grid, students say:

/c/

Moving a second counter into the grid, students say:

/ă/

And moving the last counter into the third square, students say:

/t/

Watch this short video of reading coach Carla Stanford using Elkonin boxes to help students learn to segment phonemes.

Video thumbnail for Quick Look: Elkonin Sound Boxes — Produced by Reading Universe, a partnership of WETA, Barksdale Reading Institute, and First Book

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Carla Stanford: These are called sound boxes. [Ms. Stanford points to boxes drawn in a row on a white board.] I'm going to say a word. I'm going to have you repeat the word and then we are going to push the two, the first two sounds in the word, and you can tap, so it will go like this. We'll do a practice. The word is block. Repeat.

Students: Block.

Carla Stanford: Tappers up.

Carla Stanford and students: /b/, /l/ ...

Carla Stanford: Did you hear that? '/b/, /l/, /ŏ/, /c/. Block. Excellent.

Elkonin Box Template for Phoneme Word Play

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3. Arm Tapping – Phoneme Segmentation

This game helps students understand that phonemes are parts of a whole word.

How to Play

For a given word, tell students to say and lightly tap each phoneme separately down their arm, beginning at the shoulder. Then for the same word, tell students to blend the sounds together to say the whole word while sweeping the hand that tapped each sound from their shoulder down their arm.

For example, say the word bird. Start at your shoulder and move down the arm, saying and tapping the sounds /b/, /er/, /d/. Then, sweep down the arm with your other hand while saying the whole word bird to show how the sounds blend together.

Watch an example from a student in Estella Escajeda’s third grade class! She shows us how to arm tap the word bit during a dictation lesson. This action helps her identify each phoneme before she spells the word.

Video thumbnail for Phoneme Segmenting Strategy: Arm Tapping — Produced by Reading Universe, a partnership of WETA, Barksdale Reading Institute, and First Book

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Students: /b/, /ĭ/, /t/ ... bit ...

3.2 Prepare for Word Play Activities

Course 1: Phoneme Awareness for Paraprofessionals

Elkonin Box Template for Phoneme Word Play