We want your feedback! Take our 3-minute survey and enter to win a $100 gift card from Bookshop.org!

Skill Explainer

3.2 Explicitly Teach Rhyming

Rhyming Skill Explainer

Erin Kosteva, M.Ed.

A Step-by-Step Rhyming Lesson

Bed and head

These words rhyme because they sound the same at the middle and end. Listen:

/b/, /ĕd/

/h/, /ĕd/

The part that says /ĕd/ is the same in both words. This makes them rhyming words.

I’m going to come up with a word that rhymes with chick. Hmmm.

Kick!

Do these words sound alike at the middle and end? Do they rhyme?

Egg and sun

Do these words sound the same after the first sound?

/ĕ/, /g/ and /s/, /ŭn/

No. Egg and sun do not rhyme because they don’t sound the same at the end … /g/ is not the same as /ŭn/.

Lake and bike

Do these words sound the same at the middle and end?

/l/, /āk/ and /b/, /īk/

They do both have the /k/ sound at the end, but they don’t rhyme because we’re looking at everything that comes after the first sound … the middle and the end. 

Lake and bike do not rhyme because /āk/ and /īk/ don’t sound the same.

Reading Universe is made possible by generous support from Jim & Donna Barksdale; the Hastings/Quillin Fund, an advised fund of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation (opens in new window); the AFT (opens in new window); the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation (opens in new window); and three anonymous donors.