We’re all about quick reading games – try this set of freebies for reading short a words!
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So I’ve been teaching my Five to read for a while now, and I’ll let you know that it’s been pretty slow going. It’s been a little different than my experience with his three older siblings, who were all reading fluently by this age.
Here are some reasons that our pace has been a little slower:
- I haven’t spent as much focused time teaching him to read – simply because our family has grown. And because our toddler is now getting into the garbage and likes to splash in toilets. (Sigh.)
- My Five needed a lot of time learning concepts of print – more than my other kids did. So we slowed down and spent time doing voice to print packs, pocket chart sentences, and learning with nursery rhymes.
- My Five is very easily frustrated. I really have to be careful not to overwhelm him, or he shuts down.
- We only spend a 10-15 minutes a few times a week learning to read. (And some weeks, we don’t do any structured learning at all.)
- And finally, I think he’s normal. 🙂
All this to say … we are still on short a words. He can sound them out pretty easily now, but it’s not automatic yet.
So here are some free games to help kids read short a words. Not with flash cards (no thanks!) but with a board and a die.
It’s amazing how simple these games are and how willing my Five is to play them.
Just take turns rolling a die and reading the words in the corresponding column. Doesn’t get any simpler than that!
The games progress in order from easy to hard. The first game (not pictured) has just four words in each column. Game 2 (above) has six words per column.
And we have even more CVC words in Game 3.
Game 4 has just four words in each row because each word begins with a blend or digraph.
In Game 5, children read a mix of words – some begin with a blend or digraph, and some don’t.
The last two games are the hardest of all because each column has words in different word families. Rhyming won’t work this time!
Believe it or not, we played a few rounds of every game in the pack in one go. I don’t necessarily recommend this, though, unless your reader is as interested as mine was.
*TIP! Definitely take turns reading, even though of course you don’t need the practice. It gives your learner a rest.
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We hope you enjoy these too!
Psst… looking for an affordable curriculum to teach kids to read short vowel words? We’re loving this one!
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You’re welcome, Tanya!
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