While it’s important to learn to sound out words, it’s also important (and useful!) to know a lot of words by sight. Since kids often see the color words in print, it makes sense to add them to the list of sight words that beginning readers can read automatically. Here’s a simple free game to teach kids to read color words.
This game is based on a game in Peggy Kaye’s fabulous book Games for Reading. (If you buy any book designed to help parents teach their kids to read, this one should be it! Peggy, a reading tutor, shares over seventy games, many of which I used in my classroom before I became a parent.)
Teach kids to read color words
In the free download you will find this single page game board and a set of cards with the color words red, green, yellow, blue, purple, and orange.
The rules are simple:
1. Put the color word cards face down in a pile.
2. Get a playing piece for each player.
3. Take turns picking up a card and reading the color word. Follow the arrows on the path as you move your playing piece to the closest coin of that color. Players may share the same space.
4. If a player is near the end of the path, and there is none of the color he draws ahead of him, he moves ahead to the pot of gold and wins the game.
This game was easy and enjoyable for my Five, who could follow the path without any trouble. My Three was not excited about it, but I knew he could figure out the color words by looking at the first letter of each word. We helped him find the right direction on the path. As he realized he was going to win, the game suddenly became more fun. 🙂
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Sylvia says
This is such a cute game! It’s sweet and simple! I’ve been trying to teach my special needs daughter the color words for years. I know she’ll love this game! Thanks for sharing it! I’ll be checking out your other resources too!
Anna Geiger says
Thank you, Sylvia – I hope your daughter enjoys it! I popped over to your site for a while. What a blessing you are to your family! And a VERY busy mama 🙂
Misty Nicole Overstreet-Roberts says
You have such awesome ideas on your site! My husband is an educator, and I’d love if you might consider writing a guest post on my site for homeschooling children, as well as traditionally schooled children needing extra enrichment skill! Awesome site!
Anna Geiger says
Thank you for the invitation, Misty! Why don’t you email me with more information? themeasuredmom@gmail.com. We have a new baby (just 5 weeks old), so I would need to schedule this a little far out… maybe for late May?
Natasha Mairs says
love this game! just what I need for my two youngest, . pinned this
Natasha @ Serenity You
Anna Geiger says
So glad you can use it, Natasha!
Valerie says
Cute!
Jill says
This is such a cute idea! This will be helpful for so many people.
Thank you for stopping by the Thoughtful Spot Weekly Blog Hop this week. We hope to see you drop by our neck of the woods next week!
Anna Geiger says
Thank you for the feature, Rebecca!