Phonics for Kids – Fun Ways to Teach Phonics to a Child

Introducing a child to phonics early in life can help them develop a good grasp of the spoken language, which in turn they will connect with the written language.

Even when a child is too young to read words, you can start to introduce them to the sounds of words. Although even very young children love to hear words spoken, at around age four, children generally start to make a more solid mental connection to what spoken and written words are all about.

Phonics for Kids – When teaching a child about phonics, it is important to keep the activities enjoyable and fun, so that the child remains enthusiastic and engaged.

When teaching a child about phonics, it is important to keep the activities enjoyable and fun, so that the child remains enthusiastic and engaged.

Resist the urge to make it seem too much like a serious learning activity, and at least early on, concentrate more on discovery and less on concrete right and wrong answers.

Working phonics into your daily interactions with your child, instead of only concentrating on phonics during structured learning sessions, will help a child to realize that reading and words are everywhere, and aren’t just limited to reading time.

Kids Phonics

One way to work phonics into your child’s daily activities is to simply talk with them.  Games with your child, such as saying a word and then acting it out, can be fun and can help a child learn more effectively.

Playing rhyming games or reading nursery rhymes together are also the types of activities that will help a child learn about the sounds of words and letters.

Phonics Games

Verbal phonics games can help a younger child prepare for the concept of learning phonics in connection to the written alphabet.

Singing the alphabet song together while pointing to each letter in a book, or on flash cards, is a great way to help a child recognize what the individual letters look like, while having fun. Puzzles and games that show alphabets along with pictures of words that start with that letter are a great way to introduce letter sounds to a child.

Is phonics for kids is necessary?

Phonics puzzles and games can be used for many fun learning activities, such as asking a child to find the puzzle piece that has the letter that makes a particular sound.

You can also play verbal games with your child, such as clearly pronouncing several words that start with a particular letter, letting them figure out what letter the words start with.  The nice part about verbal games is that they can be played anywhere, such as while driving in the car or walking in the park. Children love these kinds of games, and when you mix them in casually with daily activities, it will seem more like fun instead of structured learning.

After a child has a fairly good understanding of what the individual letters sound and look like, a fun learning activity is to go through a book and sound out some of the words together. This is a good way to introduce a child to more advanced phonics, such as the concept of short versus long vowel sounds  and consonant blends such as “sh” and “ch.”

By learning phonics, a child will begin to be able to sound words out on their own, which will increase their independence and love of reading.