Spelling skills are an important part of academic success. Help your child improve their spelling skills with these fun games!

Many children turn to their parents or teachers for help when trying to spell even basic words. They lack the confidence and skills for spelling independently. Yet, this skill is key for academic success, and one that becomes increasingly important as your child progresses through school.‎ Help your child improve their spelling skills with the ideas detailed below.

Start with sounds
For young kids, grasping sound/letter relationships ‎is an important part of learning how to spell. Help your child learn the sounds that go along with each letter of the alphabet, including short vowels, with some basic flashcard exercises. Come up with a key picture that corresponds to each letter, like “pizza” for “p,” “egg” for “e”, and “dog” for “d”. Write the letter using a black marker on the front of a flash card and draw the key picture on the back, then practice saying the letter/picture/sound aloud until it becomes automatic for your child, like “p, pizza, /p/”, “e, egg, /e/” and so on. Once they has grasped these letter/sound relationships, practice blending them together to form words— which is essentially basic spelling. For example, place the “a” card on a table in front of them and ask them what sound the short “a” makes, then put the “t” card next to it, and ask them what sound “t” makes. Then, ask them to blend those sounds together to form the word “at”! Try changing some letters, like replacing the “a” with an “i” or the “t” with an “n”. Later, add a third letter, then a fourth letter, etc. By practicing these exercises, you are using a multi-sensory approach to teach them important phonemic awareness, reading, and spelling skills.

Play With Math Toys
There are so many great math skills building toys that your child can play with at a young age, and she won’t even know she’s doing math! Take Magna Tiles, for instance. Using these tiles, you can dictate individual numbers to ‎your child or write them on a white board, then have her create a line of Magnatiles using that number (i.e. write the number 3 and have your child create a line of 3 Magnatiles; hold up 5 and have your child create a line of 5 Magnatiles, etc.). Then ask her which lines contains more and which contains less. You can even try simple addition or subtraction problems using Magnatiles. For instance, draw the number 2 on a whiteboard and have her build a line with 2 Magnatiles. Next, write “+4” and have her create a separate line with 4 Magnatiles. Then ask her how many Magnatiles she has altogether. Once she counts them all, write on the whiteboard “2+4=6.” Playing with Tangrams, Marble Run, and basic blocks can also enhance core math skills starting at a very young age.

Practice words with chunks
Once your child has grasped the spelling of basic consonant-vowel-consonant words (bat, pig, he, etc.), try practicing words with digraphs, or chunks. Chunks are essentially groups of letters that make one sound, like ch, sh, ph, tch, and so on. Do similar card exercises (or use magnetic tiles) to have your child create words with chunks, similar to the exercises above. For example, place a card in front of them with a chunk like “ch,” then place the “i” card next to it, followed by the “p” card, and have her blend those sounds together to form the word “chip.” Then replace “ch” with “sh,” and so on.

Teach spelling rules
Your child may feel overwhelmed by the task of spelling so many words on their own, but there are many spelling rules that ‎can help them improve their spelling skills. Try teaching them Orton Gillingham spelling rules using a notebook or flash cards. For example, teach them the Floss Rule: when an f, l, or s comes after a short vowel at the end of a single syllable word, double the last letter, like puff, fall, or bass. For the Silent e Rule, when a short word contains a vowel followed by a consonant and then an e, the first vowel is usually long and the final “e” is silent (make, ride, pole). For the CH/TCH Rule, if the sound /ch/ comes after a short vowel in a word, you typically use “tch.” Otherwise, use “ch” (batch, pitch, march). There are many more useful Orton Gillingham spelling rules like these. Just remember that there are always exceptions to each of these rules!

Play memory with sight words
Some ‎spelling words simply need to be memorized. These are typically words that don’t necessarily follow a phonetic pattern, like the words: have, this, where, there, etc. Teach your child these sight words by having them trace them in sand or salt, then in the sky, and finally, have them write them on a sheet of paper or whiteboard three times each (you can find a list of grade-appropriate sight words online). Once they have grasped the spelling of each word, try playing a game like Sight Words Memory for extra reinforcement. To do so, create a series of flash cards with two sets of each sight word. Then flip each card over and lay them out on a table. Take turns flipping them over and trying to make a match. If your child does make a match, have them close their eyes and spell the word in the air before getting a point. The person with the most points wins!

Play spelling games or apps
There are many great apps that can help your child improve their spelling skills. Try apps like Montessori Crosswords, Rocket Spelling, Freefall Spelling, and others that reinforce spelling skills while keeping your child engaged and entertained. The more practice and reinforcement, the better!

Learning to spell accurately is a key skill for writing and overall school success. Help your child build stronger spelling skills with these ideas and they will quickly begin to master this skill.

The post Practice Your ABCs With These Fun Spelling Games appeared first on EBL Coaching.

If your child has dyslexia, there are plenty of great ways to keep them reading.

Kids with dyslexia tend to struggle with reading and writing. They often have difficulty blending sounds together to form words and ‎expressing their thoughts effectively on paper. While traditional structured approaches are useful for building these skills, there are many fun, interactive apps that students with dyslexia can use to help further strengthen their reading and writing skills. Try some of the ideas below:

Bob Books #1 and #2
The Bob Books apps are great reading reinforcement tools for kids in grades pre-K-4. The first app, Bob Books #1, teaches pre-K and Kindergarten students foundational phonics skills, including individual letters and their corresponding sounds, and how to blend those sounds together to form basic words. ‎In the Bob Books #2 app, students are introduced to stories with engaging characters, along with fun, interactive games to develop mastery of basic to more advanced words. These apps follow Orton Gillingham patterns for reinforcing foundational decoding skills.

iWriteWords
‎Many kids with dyslexia have trouble properly forming letters and numbers and spelling words correctly. This app helps kids build these skills in an enjoyable and engaging manner. Using a multi-sensory format, students use their fingers to trace upper and lower case letters as well as numbers, while learning how to appropriately write them using top-to-bottom formations. They later work on spelling basic words to reinforce encoding and phonics skills. The images are colorful and child-friendly, keeping kids engaged and happy.

Montessori Crosswords
This app is a useful tool for helping dyslexic kids in grades pre-K-4 build basic to more advanced spelling and reading skills. With the app, students have fun building words using a drag-and-drop method, beginning with consonant-vowel-consonant words, then moving onto words with consonant blends, words with digraphs, and words with more complex patterns. There are also “themes,” such as Christmas, clothes, and food, where kids build words that fall into these categories. The pictures are playful and colorful, and the app provides ample practice for building key reading and spelling skills.

Read2Go
Read2Go helps elementary and middle school students engage with books and further develop their reading skills with eBooks. With this app, they have access over 200,000 eBooks through its partnership with Bookshare. Students can search for specific book titles, peruse book categories, download books, and read them directly from Bookshare. They can also highlight important text to practice active reading and study skills, can change the text’s font size and color, and can even have books read aloud to them as part of the app’s text-to-speech functionality. It’s a great tool for students with reading challenges who benefit from more interactive options than paper books offer.

StoryPals
‎StoryPals helps elementary and middle school students with dyslexia build stronger reading skills. With this app, students can choose to either read a passage aloud or have it read to them, then answer corresponding comprehension questions. Kids love the animated characters, colorful artwork, and interesting topics that these 24 stories offer. The app also saves student quiz scores so parents can track their child’s reading comprehension progress.

Building reading and writing skills doesn’t have to be a boring task! Students with dyslexia can have fun strengthening their skills with these interactive apps, helping them to ultimately achieve academic success.

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