Phonics Teaching Resources
Make teaching phonics easy with printable phonics worksheets, activities, games and more designed for elementary ELA and ELAR teachers.
This collection of curriculum-aligned teaching resources has been carefully reviewed by our expert teaching team to make sure every resource is classroom-ready — so we can make your lesson planning easier!
New to teaching phonics, or just looking for new ways to engage your students? Read on for a primer from our teacher team!
What Is Phonics?
You've likely heard the word "phonics" thousands of times throughout your own education and maybe on one of those old as from the '90s. But what is phonics, exactly?
Phonics is technically defined as the systematic instruction of the relationships between letters and sounds in written language. But that's a mouthful, isn't it? More simply, phonics is the word we use to refer to the method of teaching reading by focusing on the relationship between written letters and the sounds they represent.
In phonics, kids learn how to decode written words by recognizing the sound-symbol correspondence.
Phonics vs. Phonemic Awareness
When we start talking about letters and their sounds, we start to wander into phonemic awareness territory. So what's the difference?
The words phonics and phonemic are similar, and the two concepts are — surprise, surprise — related. But there are key differences.
Phonemic awareness is essentially the ability to identify and manipulate individual sounds — aka phonemes — in spoken language. It's those individual sounds and their correspondence to the letter symbols that can be used by kids to then decode written words.
So students learn to recognize the individual sounds of spoken language (phonemes) and how these sounds can be represented by letters (graphemes) in written language. Then they apply this knowledge to decode written words by understanding the sound-symbol correspondence.
Consider this example:
- Let's say your student can identify the separate sounds in a spoken word such as "cat" (i.e., /k/ /a/ /t/). That's phonemic awareness.
- Now let's say you're teaching that same student that the letter "c" represents the /k/ sound and that the letter "a" represents the /a/ sound, and that these sounds combine to form the word "cat." That's phonics!
How to Teach Phonics
OK, you probably already know that phonics is all about teaching word recognition via grapheme-phoneme associations and letter-sound correspondences.
It’s a means of teaching early readers the pieces that make up a word so they can blend them together to decode the English language as readers and writers.
But how do you teach it?
In the earliest stages, phonics instruction typically begins with teaching students the most common letter-sound relationships. You start with consonants, then move on to vowels, then consonant blends.
Students then learn to sound out words by decoding the letters and blending the sounds together to form words.
Phonics Vocabulary Terms
The English language system is one of the hardest to teach and learn, so how do you teach phonics? Let’s start with the phonics vocabulary.
- For starters, there are 26 letters that create approximately 44 phonemes, the word for the individual speech sounds that make up words. Put together, phonemes make words. OK, easy enough, right?
- Well, these phonemes can be written in over more than 200 different letter combinations, known as graphemes. Graphemes can be made up of 1 letter (such as “p” in “pig”), 2 letters (such as “gh” in ghost), 3 letters (such as “igh” in night), or 4 letters (such as “ough” in rough).
- Then there are digraphs or two letters that work together to make one sound — such as “ph” in graph. But wait, isn’t that a grapheme? Yup, a digraph is a type of grapheme.
- So is a trigraph, trigraphs, aka three letters that work together to make one sound, such as “dge” in edge.
- And if you’re teaching phonics, you can’t forget dipthongs, the name for a sound that is formed by the combination of two vowels in a single syllable, such as “ou” in loud.
Most students will spend kindergarten, first, and even second grade getting a handle on all phonics elements!
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Segmenting and Blending Mats
A set of beautifully designed templates for students to practice blending and segmenting words.
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Compound Words with Pictures - Combining Word Cards
Combine words to make compound words and boost vocabulary skills with a printable combining words word wall.
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Medial L Words - List & Flashcards
Practice reading and articulating Medial L words with a list of 50 words and accompanying illustrated flash cards.
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Months of the Year Worksheets
Read, write, and spell the months of the year with a set of printable Months of the Year worksheets for kindergarten.
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Days of the Week - Months of the Year Word Search
Practice spelling the days of the week and months of the year with printable Day and Month Word Search worksheets.
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Common Spelling Rules - Instructional Slide Deck
Boost your students' spelling skills with an instructional slide deck teaching the different spelling rules.
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Sounds of OO - Glasses Template
Review the long and short “oo” sound by creating a pair of “sOOper” funky glasses!
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CVC Word Chain Ladders - Worksheets
Build word chains with CVC words using this set of printable phonics worksheets.
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Phoneme Segmentation Task Cards
Segment beginning, middle vowel, and final phonemes with this set of 20 CVC word task cards.
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Phoneme Segmentation - Count and Hook Task Cards
Help students gain mastery in phoneme segmentation with these hands-on count and hook task cards.
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Alphabet Playdough Mats for Fine Motor Development
A set of alphabet playdough letter mats to help children develop their fine motor skills and identify the letters of the alphabet.
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CVC Word Chain Task Cards
Manipulate individual phonemes in CVC words to create new ones with this set of differentiated task cards.
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Blending Phonemes Secret Message-Matching Activity
Blend phonemes to build words and uncover the secret message!
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Google Interactive CVCC Word Building Activity
Practice building, reading, and writing words with consonants, vowels, blends, and digraphs while spelling CVCC words.
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Sweet Sight Words Worksheet - THAT
Practice reading, writing, and identifying the high-frequency word “that” from the Kindergarten-level Dolch sight words list.
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Sweet Sight Words Worksheet - What
Practice reading, writing, and identifying the high-frequency word “what” from the Kindergarten-level Dolch sight words list.
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Alphabetical Order Task Cards - Set 1
A set of 11 task cards alphabetizing a series of words to the first letter.
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Uppercase and Lowercase Letter Maze - 'Yy'
A fun maze to use when learning how to identify uppercase and lowercase letters.
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Sweet Sight Words Worksheet - MY
Practice reading, writing, and identifying the high-frequency word “my” from the Pre-Primer Dolch sight words list.
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Sweet Sight Words Worksheet - YOU
Practice reading, writing, and identifying the high-frequency word “you” from the Pre-Primer Dolch sight words list.
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Roll it! Read it! Write it! Dolch Pre-Primer Sight Words
Practice reading and writing Dolch’s pre-primer high-frequency words with this board game for multiple players.
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Spelling Suffixes Anchor Charts - Plurals
Help students understand when to apply the right plural spellings based on the ending of any word.
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Vowel Digraphs Poster Pack
A poster showing words and pictures for various vowel blends.
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Days of the Week Activity Mat
Review the order and spelling of the days in a week with a printable Days of the Week Activity Mat!
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Days of the Week Spelling Worksheets
Use these Days of the Week Spelling worksheets to help your students practice reading, writing, and spelling the Days of the week.
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Vowel Digraph Cover Up Game
Practice vowel teams with your students with this set of three fun partner cover up games.
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Roll and Read Vowel Teams Diphthong Activity
Explore different diphthongs with this fun gamified diphthong activity.
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AI, AY and A_E Vowel Team Lesson Resource Pack
Introduce students to AI, AY, and A_E vowel digraphs with this set of teaching slides and mini activity book.
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Diphthong Vowel Teams Posters
Display this set of posters highlighting the main diphthong vowel teams with word examples and mouth articulation images.
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Vowel Teams Sort OA, OW, and OE
Decode words with "oa", "oe", or "ow" long "o" vowel teams using 18 picture cards with sorting mats.
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Plural Nouns Chart - Printable Plural Rules Guide
Give your students a reference guide to help them remember all of the different plural rules.
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Blending and Segmenting Phonemes - Interactive Activity
Practice blending and segmenting phonemes in common words with this engaging, interactive activity.