Welcome! I know parenting gives not only joy but also a responsibility to shape the future of our kids. Well, I understand the reason you reached this place. Do not worry we are sailing in the same boat. I as a parent can understand your anxiety and concern. Rest assured you can get free CVC cards and all possible information regarding using the card to teach English words to your little one.
Let’s Dig A Little Deeper
Contents
Introduction to CVC Words
First of all know what CVC stands for C- Consonant, V- Vowel, and C- Consonant. In simple words, CVC denotes single syllable, small vowel words that begin with a consonant. Then follows another little vowel and ends with a consonant.
E.g., mAt, hEn, pIn, dOg, and cUp. Can you see the vowels in between consonants on either side? Yes the A, E, I, O, U.
I taught my little one the CVC words soon after she learned to know their consonant sounds and small vowel sounds. Do you want to know the magic of CVC words? HERE YOU GO! Each letter gets the same pronunciation as loved by the kids.
Let me give you an example. I taught my child two words namely “gas” and “was.” She quickly understood that “gas” makes the CVC word and not “was.” Because letter S sounds as S in the word “gas” and as Z in the word “was.” My little one easily grabbed the fundamental concept, and you kid also can do the same as they know the sound of each alphabet.
Sounds interesting? Yes, it is.
Now I am sure you understood CVC words. Use the free CVC cards with and without pictures to make your child practice. I usually ask my kid to read CVC words from books. She loves to read as the little ones always feel proud about imitating us.
Importance of Teaching CVC Words
Now comes a question Why teach CVC words? I will help with my answer.
- It helps kids to learn to spell and makes them speak efficiently.
- When you teach you child with CVC words, you can teach them the importance of relating sound and the corresponding alphabet.
- The three magic letters in CVC words significantly helps the child to study words soon after learning the alphabets.
Yes, my child first understood the sound of the letter. Then it contributed to recognizing the word with the sound. She started connecting the distinct sound of a letter to make small words.
Preschoolers can quickly write words when they get used to CVC words without any spelling mistake. The CVC word helps them to recognize the distinct sound of each letter.
CVC letters can also help children with a hearing problem. I have addressed that as well in this posting.
When To Introduce CVC Words
I am afraid as I don’t know when to start teaching CVC words to my kid. I can connect with you as a parent. Do not panic; just introduce CVC words to your child soon after your little one has learned the sounds of each English alphabet.
I taught my kid CVC words by connecting the original alphabet sounds.
But it depends on the child’s ability to pick up the English phonics not because they are fast or slow learners but due to their native language. If their mother tongue happens to be written from right to left like Arabic, Urdu, etc. they might take time than the kids who learned mother tongue written from left to right.
To precisely answer your question I started teaching CVC words when my little one was two years and six months old. You can start anywhere between 3 and five years. Typically Pre-schoolers can quickly grab CVC words. When reaching the (5 – 7 years) kindergarten level, they can master CVC words and play with the phrase.
Segmenting CVC Words
Follow carefully to understand the Segmenting of CVC words.
First, explain to your little one that CVC words come in a pattern of vowels in between the consonants. Give them examples that can help them to relate with easily. Cat, Dog, etc
Then tell them you will sound the words. Use some colors to mark each sound of the word.
I Used The Following Ways To Make Her Understand
- Food
Choose a delicious food your kid loves, e.g., Gems or Jelly Bean candies.
Ask your child to place one gem when you call out a CVC word with the same sound. If they set it correctly, then treat them with Gems. Sounds funny? But it works.
- Games
Play games like Beetel, Lego or anything that has more pieces.
Ask your kid to place one piece when you call out a CVC word with the same sound. If they put it correctly, then allow them to use three pieces in their game.
- Make it Simpler
Place the same number of counters similar to the sounds in the word. Counter words for Cat. Mat, Bat, etc. Use Table 1 for shirt saying words.
- Make it difficult
Without using any illustration use long sounds as shown in Table 2 for more practice.
What Is Blending in CVC Words
Want to know about Blending? Read More
Blending sounds into CVC words makes learning more exciting. When you think that your kid can handle few vowels and consonants, then start teaching about mixing those sounds to form meaningful words.
Initially, blending may be touch for few children. My child had some challenges. No worries. It is because she understood the alphabets and sounds. She can also sound out all words sound-by-sound, but could not figure out the way to smoothly connect the sounds.
She was sounding like this “The /m/ /u/ /g/ mug is /b/ /e/ /l/ /o/ /w/ below the /j/ /u/ /g/ jug.” I tried direct instruction to teach her blending.
Wow, it worked. Do you want to know how? Very Simple.
Help kids with recognizing patterns within words. Use some common word families. Use a blending board containing the word families. Download the free blending cards from her.
Ways to blend CVC Cards – Three Methods
Combine a CVC word when reading (and writing).
Always start with c-v-c method first. Then move to the word family clusters like op, et, id, ad, ab and more.
You can try vowel-consonant word families. E.g
Then you can start making some craft work including word family for flowers etc.
This will help your little one to cut, fold, sound identification, blending words, and writing.
Just cut and fold petals using paper. Then open one leaf at a time and read the starting sound of each. Now after opening all petals blend the initial sound with the entire word and teach them to form families.
Alternatively, download blending cards from here for free and teach individual word sounds and finally the word family.
What Comes After CVC Words
OK, I agree with you. What will come after CVC words? Is it a valid question? The principle of phonics learning tells that kids must learn to spell English in a logical and time-tested series. Starting from simple words and moving to understand difficult words. Now, this becomes easy after learning CVC words.
You can change the order but remember to teach your little one with all the areas mentioned above. Let me give you an example of a word family with a CV term that forms 45 standard words. I will start with a brain, nail, maid, etc. Now it’s your turn to fill in more. Have fun with your little
CVC words help kids to present words in an orderly pattern and contribute to improving their memory power. They can read, recognize and remember quickly.
Also, kids can improve their visual memory required to write the spelling of the English words.
How To Teach CVC Words To Kindergarten
When kids grow, it will become little harder to teach them. I can understand your concern here. As a preschooler they obey you. But when they grow they have so many questions and to handle CVC words for Kindergarten might need some skills. Just know what they are.
I always prepare a lesson plan and make my little know the idea.
Break each step into simpler steps and go slow but be firm.
Use a systematic approach and use Visual Cards. At the age of five and above, they can quickly grasp words taught visually.
How to sound words – A Lesson Plan for you.
- Use flash cards. Download from here for free.
- Pronounce the sound of the alphabet.
- Elongate the sounds.
- Blend the sounds.
- Pronounce little faster.
- Finally, utter the word.
Never forget to make expressions and movement. That’s all you are done. Your kid will catch it up very quickly than you think.
My kids easily followed me, and after we completed sounding out all of the words, we identified the pictures on the flash cards to their matching words.
How To Teach CVC Words With Fun
Yes, it’s time to have some fun while reading. Being a parent, I always emphasize with parents. Dealing with kids needs a lot of patience. Most of us struggle a lot here. No worries just add some fun to their work and see the results. Trust me you will be amazed to see their involvement. Join me to know how to teach CVC words the fun way.
Make use of race cars and make blending CVC words a real fun to the kids.
The steps I followed as given below.
I asked my kid to hold the sound of each letter in her mouth till the race car moves to the next letter. I would hear the sound. Then slowly I increased the speed of the race car. So she will hold the sound and release it with the race car. It did wonders, and she grasped it very quickly.
Now next strategy is to score for Nonsense Words and Real Word.
This method will work for the Kindergarten children. As kids always demand some perks for their work, I used this method.
If your child sounds and blends words correctly, then give a score. If the words do not make any sense, then give a much lesser score. Either way, the score will keep kids motivated. At the end based on the score treat them with ice creams or chocolates. They will work hard for their incentives. Sounds good? Yes, it is.
How To Use CVC Picture Cards Without Words
Let me now walk you through two sections.
Section 1: Picture Cards Alone and no words.
Section 2: Words alone without pictures.
Photo cards can engage kids quickly. Here’s the catch. Kids get attracted towards pictures.
Download CVC word pictures from here and use them this way.
Ask them to look at the picture and name them loudly. For example a CAT image. Let your kid read it aloud and SLOWLY. The sound gets isolated into three parts. The Consonant Vowel and Consonant sounds.
Make use of the sorting mats with CVC words. They can start with the mat and match the picture to the particular vowel sound.
Once they grasp that, then move to the small vowel mat. Match pictures with the CVC words.
Just print the images from here and laminate it for more elegance. Give your little one the mat and the words. Ask them to pick one card and name the picture loudly and match with the vowel.
Best way to make them understand the word and the spelling. They can easily recognize the picture. When they tell the name of the picture loudly, they master the sound, and next is to identify the word.
Simple isn’t? Yes, certainly
How to use CVC words without pictures
This part gets little tough. Download and Print these word cards. Remember these cards do not have pictures.
Wondering how to make them understand? Hey, I will tell you. I love miming. So what to do with miming? Yes, you guessed it right.
Just ask them to pick a card. Then mime the meaning of the card. They will tell the name loudly. This will make them know the word. Next time they see the card, they will know the word and the spelling. Just superb!
You can mime and ask them to imitate. Full of fun. You will feel relaxed after spending time with your kid with a sense of satisfaction as well.
Double Bonanza!
Another way to teach words without pictures. Ask me how? You can draw the meaning of the word. An ant or a cat etc.
You can improve their motor skills this way.
Keep rocking!
CVC Words For Speech Therapy
Kids with multiple speech disorder will find putting words together difficult. How much ever simple it is they find it tough. Mom of an autism kid or you have a child with down syndrome? Do not worry; you can follow this method and make you kids learn words.
How to organize the words?
Download words in the order as given below
CV words – cow
VC words – up
CVC words – cup
CVCV words – baby
Note the consonants and vowels I have used to describe the sounds in the word and the not the letters itself.
I will make it clear with an example, the word “shoe” has four letters. S_H_O_E, but only two sounds namely SH and OE. Sh and O sound. You got it now I guess.
Now I will confirm that “shoe” is a CV word. Yes, Consonant S sound and Vowel O sound.
But your question is, how will you choose the cards to begin with speech therapy?
Start with CV and VC words. Pick those cards first. Ask your child to identify the card. If your child answers correctly, then move to the next word. If not keep them as the base and teach them one by one.
Then move on to the CVC cards.
Once your kid masters that move on to CVCV cards.
At the end go back and make a note of the sounds which your child could not recognize. Focus on those sounds.
This way you can reduce the burden stage wise, and they will pick up for sure.
Always make your child imitate you when you take a card. Once they get a hold on the sound, you can ask them to say on their own.
Allow time and do not push them. If your kid does not imitate any sound, then ask them to imitate your mouth movement and the action. Slowly move on to the sounds. Always remember to appreciate them and never put your face down in front of them.
Tips To Make CVC Words More Effective
Play with kids and teach them CVC words.
Allow them to work with some things and make reading fun.
Hold some yoga poses and perform some actions with words.
Place the picture cards into the mailbox and ask them to open and take it.
Let them play games on CVC words on your smart phone.
Make mistakes and allow them to correct you while making sounds.
Play treasure hunt by hiding the words and asking them to find.
Record when they read and say the sounds and show it to them.
Never forget to Pat on their back and hug them. Yes, they will be flat and will pick up things fast.
I am successful because I follow this. I wish you all success in making your kids master CVC words.
All the best!
