Easy Literacy Activities

We offer a variety of literacy activities that can be easily implemented at home. These activities focus on letters, sounds, reading, and writing. Being able to identify letters and sounds is a skill that is essential for kids to read unfamiliar words by themselves. Having letter-sound knowledge will allow children to make the link between the unfamiliar print words to their spoken knowledge.

Practice speech sounds and letters during everyday life.

When you are at the grocery store, tell your child what you need in syllables and let your child guess. For example, “I need pep-pers. What do I need?”
When sorting your laundry into colors or item type, say it out loud. Ask your child to think of other words that start with the same sound as what you are sorting.
When traveling, look for letters on signs you see. Find ones that have a letter in your name and say its sound.

Practice early literacy skills and understand ideas during everyday life.

When playing, use toys and games to talk about how spoken words are made up of sound parts.
When preparing meals, gather ingredients together, talk about what they are and what step comes next.
Before leaving home, make a list of tasks to do. Say them aloud and and write them down together, focusing on sounds, letters, words, or ideas your child knows.

Using rhyming to focus on letters and sounds.

Nursery Rhymes – read, sing, or say nursery rhymes. Help your child learn them. Point out the parts that rhyme.
Rhyming Riddles – Make up riddles and guessing games using words that rhyme or words that start with the same sounds. For example, “What kind of cake would a snake make? He might make a lake cake.” The rhymes can be silly and fun and will get your child thinking about words and listening for rhymes.

Introduction to Zoo Phonics which helps child identify letters and sounds.

Practicing writing

Mix, Fix, and Write – pick a word, set aside the letters your child will need to spell the word (all mixed up), tell your child to fix the letters to spell that word. Once they spelled the word correctly, they write it down. You can use paper, magnetic, or block letters. For writing, your child can use pencil, crayon, marker, etc. You can even have your child use chalk or a little white board. For word ideas Click Here.
If you want to make it more challenging, use four or five letter words.
If your child is struggling, help them sound it out. Ask them, “what letter do you hear first?” say the word again. “What comes after that letter?” and so on.