Voicing Vowels

by FamilyEducation Staff

Grade: 2
Subject: Language arts
Skills: Reading, writing, pronunciation
Materials: Paper, pencil
Time: 15-20 minutes

This exercise shows your child how to sound out words -- particularly words with vowels -- without going letter by letter.

Step 1:
Write down a series of rhyming words that contain the same sounds and the same letters. For example, "peek, seek, and meek"; or "lip, tip, hip, and flip."

Step 2:
Read the list aloud to your child, pointing out the letters that repeat the rhyming sounds -- that is, the "eek" or the "ip" in the examples above. Ideally, your child will see a connection between the letters and the repeated rhyming sounds.

Step 3:
Write a nonsense word that uses one of the rhyming sounds you've already introduced -- for example, "deek." Ask your child to read the nonsense word aloud. If he can, this indicates he's able to pronounce letter sounds based on a family of "eek" words.

Step 4:
Try writing more complicated words based on the same rhyming family. For example, you could write "seeker" or "flipper." See if your child can read these words, as well.

Step 5:
Write a list of rhyming words -- for example, "bay, ray, say, may, pay." Tell your child you're going to make up a story using all these words. Then recite an off-the-cuff sentence, such as, "On the bay was a ray of sun -- say, you may pay me a dollar to see it!" Write another list of rhyming words and ask your child to use this list to come up with a sentence or two.

For more tips and activities, visit eSCORE.com.