Are you looking for engaging activities for beginning sounds practice? These small group activities will help your students build their phonological awareness skills as they practice identifying initial sounds in words.
The Importance of Practicing Initial Sounds
One of the first steps in learning how to read is to understand that words are made up of smaller units of sound. The initial sound in a word is often the easiest for young learners to isolate and identify, making this an important skill to practice in kindergarten.
As students practice identifying beginning sounds in words, they will be developing a strong foundation of phonological awareness. As we can see in Hollis Scarborough’s Reading Rope visual, phonological awareness intertwines with other sub-skills to help students become skilled readers.
Learning how to isolate and identify the initial sound in a word takes time and practice, but this skill is essential for students as they learn to read and write in kindergarten. Small group literacy instruction is a great way to give your students the practice and repetition they need with this phonological awareness skill.
6 Small Group Beginning Sounds Activities
As your students work to identify beginning sounds in words, it can be helpful to incorporate some engaging activities into your small group literacy lessons. This will allow you to bring some much-needed variety to the repetition they need to master this phonological awareness skill.
Here are six activity ideas that you can add to your small group literacy lesson plans. Your students will love these fun activities for initial sounds practice!
1. Alphabet Soup
For this fun activity, each student is given a paper soup bowl and spoon for the alphabet soup that they’re going to make. They will take turns choosing a picture card, saying the first sound, putting the card into their bowl and then mixing it around using their paper spoon.
You will keep going around the table, letting students add to their soup bowls while identifying the initial sound. For even more repetition, students can name the beginning sounds again as they remove the picture cards from their soup bowls at the end of the game.
2. Feed Me
This fun game gives students the chance to isolate and compare the beginning sounds in two different words.
Each student will have a “Feed Me” monster mat and some small chips, tokens, or other manipulatives. You will say two words out loud as the students listen to see if the words begin with the same sound. If they do, the students will each feed a chip to their monsters. This simple activity really grabs their attention and encourages them to listen for the initial sounds in words!
3. Thumbs Up
This activity also encourages students to listen for the beginning sounds in words, but differs slightly from the Feed Me activity. Rather than solely auditory input, students will look at two different pictures and decide if they represent words with the same beginning sound.
Each student will have a popsicle stick with a thumbs up showing on one side and a thumbs down showing on the other side. They will use their sticks to indicate if the two pictures represent words with the same beginning sound: Thumbs up if they do, thumbs down if they don’t.
4. Sound-O
This twist on Bingo is a fun way for students to practice listening for the beginning sound in words.
You will choose a picture card and the students will listen as you say the word on your card. They will look for a picture on their Sound-O card that matches the beginning sound of the word you said. If they find one, they can place a token on that square. The first student to fill up their board will yell out “Sound-O!”.
To give the students another chance to listen for initial sounds, you can have them orally check their pictures to your cards when they have a Sound-O. You can emphasize the similar sounds in each word pair as you verify that they have all of the matching pictures.
5. Little Shop of Sounds
This activity is a great way to help students make the connection between phonemes and graphemes as they continue to practice beginning sounds.
In this activity, students will take turns “buying” items from the Little Shop of Sounds. They will name the picture, identify the beginning sound, then point to the letter that makes the sound. Once they have done this successfully, they can place the picture in their shopping cart.
6. Trash It
Using non-examples can also be helpful for students who are working on mastering initial sounds. The Trash It activity gives students the chance to listen for words that don’t belong.
The students will look at a strip with three pictures and listen for the beginning sound of each word. They will place a small trash can card on top of the picture that doesn’t have the same initial sound. You can then discuss with the students why they made the choice they did.
Printable Activities for Beginning Sounds
These activities for beginning sounds are included in a bundle of Phonological Awareness Small Group Lessons. With these activities, you’ll be able to guide your students through essential components of phonological awareness, including identifying initial sounds. These lessons are packed with engaging activities and include detailed plans that align with the Science of Reading.
Just head over to my TPT store to take a closer look at everything included in this bundle of phonological awareness activities. You’ll love having such a wide variety of options to help your students become more confident in their early literacy skills!
Save These Initial Sounds Activities for Kindergarten
Are you short on time? Be sure to save this post so you can come back to it later! Just add the pin below to your favorite teaching board on Pinterest. You’ll be able to quickly find these beginning sounds activities when you’re creating lesson plans for your small group literacy instruction.
