Speech sound play
can be fun and very beneficial for speech, language and literacy learning, not
to mention helping with a boring car trip without screens!
The technical term for speech sound awareness which includes the ability to
manipulate speech sounds is ‘phonological awareness’. A little ironic when you
break it into multisyllables and sound it out: ‘fo-ni-lo-ji-kuw’!
When playing these speech sound awareness games, talk about the speech sounds rather than naming the ‘letters’ associated with them. For example, if you are talking about the word “fall” and want to highlight the ‘f’ sound, say: “’fall’ starts with the ffff sound” rather than “fall starts with the “eff” sound”. It can be a bit confusing for children with so many variations between speech sounds and letter names. For example, the letter ‘G’, if said like “gee”, doesn’t actually contain the ‘g’ sound (‘guh’) made at the back of the tongue. So, when thinking and talking about speech, try to highlight the speech sounds rather than the letter names.
CLAP THE SYLLABLE
You can count/clap out the syllables in words together when you:
- point out pictures in books: little (2), yellow (2), digger (2), stuck (1), mud (1)
- drive along and see different vehicles: truck (1), car (1), tractor (2), helicopter (4)
- eat dinner: peas (1), potatoes (3), salad (2), chicken (2)
You could also break a word into syllables like a robot (monotone voice like a robot) and your child has to guess what the word is: e.g. com-pu-tuh. Remember to break up a word as we say it, rather than thinking about how it is spelled. Otherwise it can turn into an accent (com-pu-terrrr).
PASS THE SYLLABLE
Each person can have a turn to say one syllable of a word and ‘pass the syllable’ Choose the word and decide who will start off…
e.g. ‘dinosaur’ You: di, Dad: na, Child: saur.
I WENT TO THE MARKET
The first player starts by saying “I went to the market and I bought a book”. The next player repeats the sentence and adds another item beginning with the same sound, e.g. “I went to the market and I bought a book and a ball”. Play until no-one can add another item.
SEARCH AND FIND
Go into a room in the house and see how many things you can find that start with a named sound, e.g. a ‘k’ sound. This can be done in the car as you travel too!
You can split a word up for your child to find and this becomes a great task for your child to listen and blend sounds e.g. k-a-t (cat), b-oo-k, p-e-n, ch-r-ai-n (train), f-oh-n (phone), sh-oo (shoe).
I SPY
A classic that you may already play. If playing with a letter, also add the sound: “I spy something that starts with the letter ‘bee’ that makes the ‘b’ sound”.
How about mixing it up?! The first player starts by giving a clue, e.g. “I spy something you wear that rhymes with shoot” (the answer might be boot). To make the game harder, the clue could be “I spy something that starts the same as bed”.
PASS THE RHYME
The first player starts with a word and the next person in the circle must think of a word that rhymes. The rhyming word can be a made-up nonsense word, as long as it has the same ending sounds (remember this might not be the same letters!) e.g. bed (real) – gred (nonsense) – red – fed – led.
LICENSE PLATE GAME
As each license plate goes by on the opposite side of the road, think of words together that begin or end with the letters you see e.g. PAE564 = pea, pie, pat.