Soft Foam Cubes - Word Family

Learning to read becomes an appealing game with these 4cm soft foam phonics Word Family cubes! \n \nWord families are groups of words that have a common feature or pattern - they have some of the same combinations of letters in them and a similar sound. For example, at, cat, hat, and fat are a family of words with the "at" sound and letter combination in common. \nThe goals of the Word Family Cubes are to introduce common two-and three-letter word families to beginning readers. The hands-on activities will provide a fun opportunity for learners to be creative as they go through the learning process. \n \nThe kit contains 6 yellow cubes: 3 two-letter Word Family cubes (ar; at; ow; ug; ig; ip; op; am; og; ed; en; un; ad; an; ay; ot; ag; ap) and 3 three-letter word family cubes: (ink; ave; and; one; eat; ace; are; ick; ore; ain; ack; ing; ear; ail; ake; ate; ine; ame) \n

Suggested Activities with Word Family Cubes:

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Fast Rhymes:

\nUse Word Family Cubes to build rhyming skills! One player chooses and rolls one Word Family Cube. Once rolled, all players have a minute to create new words that use the letters on the cube. Players can write their words on a separate piece of paper. The player with the most words that no one else listed, wins! After the game, encourage students or children to create rhyming poems from their list of words. \n \nSample roll: ear \nPossible answers: pear; tear; bear; clear; near; fear; hear; dear; wear; year. \n

Word Connections:

\nIntroduce the different parts of a sentence with Word Family Cubes! First, roll all three cubes, and have players list words that contain the rolled group of letters. Work with students on selecting three words from their list, one from each Word Family Cube, and creating a sentence that uses those words. Then, use the sentence they create to introduce the different parts of a sentence. Ask the students who is the sentence about (pronoun)? What is the person doing (verb)? Where is the person (noun)? What describes the person or the place (adjective)? \nSample roll: ail, are and one \nSample Sentence: I was alone on the bare trail \n

Word Solitaire:

\nEncourage students to create 30 words with only 10 rolls of the Word Family Cubes. To ease them into this game have them use the following consonants to begin each new word: T, P, H, R, C, L, M. This activity will open doors to dictionary use as well!