Why is Word Work Important?

In kindergarten, students are exposed to a variety of different reading skills, such as phoneme (sound) isolation, sight words, CVC words, rhyming words, word families, blends and digraphs, CVCe words, and the list goes on. By working with words in a meaningful way each day, students gain a deeper understanding of the sound and spelling patterns in words, grow their sight word knowledge, and expand their vocabulary.

1. Scootin' for Words

This word work activity is a great way to get students out of their seats and actively learning.  To prep, grab a stack of notecards and write one word on each notecard. You can write sight words, CVC words, or CVCe words. Place a notecard on each student's desk. Students will need a whiteboard and a dry-erase marker.

Students will stand behind the desk, read the word on the notecard, and write it on their whiteboard. When the teacher says “Scoot,” all students will scoot to the desk next to them, moving clockwise. They'll repeat the process by reading and writing the next word.

After each “Scoot,” randomly call on a student to read you their word. This is a great way to spot check students and keep them on their toes. To differentiate this activity, you can scramble the letters on the notecards and have students read the word, unscramble it, and write it correctly on their whiteboard.

2. CVC Mazes

CVC mazes are a fun word work activity for practicing CVC words. To play, write CVC words on notecards or use CVC picture cards if you have them. Place the cards in a deck face down. On a whiteboard, draw twenty-six circles and write the letters of the alphabet inside.

Students will draw a card, read the word, and use a manipulative such as wiggly eyes, mini erasers, or plastic cubes to cover the letters that make up the word. If the word has the same letter as the beginning and ending sound, such as the word “bib,” students will stack their manipulatives on that letter to show that it is used twice in that word. Lastly, they'll use magnetic letters to build the word.

Check out the 120 ready-made Word Maze Activity Mats, perfect for Kindergarten and First Grade.

3. Kaboom

Kaboom is a high-energy word work game that you can use to practice any type of word. To make your own DIY Kaboom game, write words on twenty-five popsicle sticks. You can use sight words, CVC words, words with beginning blends or digraphs, etc. Place the sticks word side down in a jar or plastic cup. Write the word “KABOOM” on 5 popsicle sticks and add those to the jar.

Students will draw a stick and read the word. If they read the word correctly, they get to keep the stick. If they read it incorrectly, it goes back in the jar. When a student pulls a KABOOM stick, they must put all of their popsicle sticks back into the jar and place the KABOOM stick in a discard pile.

Play continues as students take turns drawing sticks and reading the words. When the 5th and final KABOOM stick is pulled, students count up the number of sticks they have and the player with the most is the winner!

You can make this game work for word family words by using less popsicle sticks and KABOOM sticks and making smaller sets for each word family. You may use ten word sticks and two KABOOM sticks per set.

4. Word Searches

One of the most popular word work activities is word searches! Students love putting on their detective hat and searching for hidden words. You can hide any type of word in a word search to help students practice different literacy skills such as CVC words, CVCe words, short vowel words, long vowel words, or even sight words or word family words.

To make your own word search, draw a 5 x 5 table on the whiteboard. Choose three to five words to hide in the word search, writing those in the spaces first. Then, fill in the extra spaces with random letters. You may want to do this while your students are at specials, recess, or before school so they don't see where you hide the words!

To play, have students take turns coming up to the whiteboard and using a dry-erase marker to shade in the letters for the words they find. If you have magnets, they can use these to mark the letters as well.

Make this easier by writing the words they're looking for off to the side. Students can mark them off as they find them. To make this more challenging, have the students find the words independently and then write them off to the side.

You can also grab these Word Search Activity Mats, which can be reused over and over during morning work, centers, teacher station, and more!

5. Tic-Tac-Toe Words

To play Tic-Tac-Toe Words, draw a simple Tic-Tac-Toe board on the whiteboard. Write a word in each space. Again, you can practice any type of spelling or sound pattern with this game. Split your students into two teams.

Students will take turns representing their team and choosing a word. If they get the word correct, they get to mark and X or O on that space. If they don't say the word correctly, their team's turn is over and the next team chooses a word. Play continues until one team gets three in a row. Continue playing a few rounds in order to let each student get a chance to represent their team.

This would also be a great partner game during small groups. You can draw several game boards on the whiteboard and have students spread out and play in pairs.

6. Word Work Boom Cards

Boom Cards are the perfect choice to add a digital spin to your word work activities. These virtual flashcard games allow students to practice a variety of skills, such as CVC word families, CVCe words, L blends, digraphs, and more.

There are many benefits to using Boom Cards for word work. Not only are they interactive and fun, but they include audio directions, making it clear for students to know exactly what they are supposed to do. There are also audio picture names, so students are never guessing what the picture is.

Plus, to save you grading time, Boom Cards are self-checking and give students immediate feedback on their responses. Boom Cards are an effective way to encourage independence in your classroom and allows you to spend focused time with other students during small groups, literacy centers, or morning work time.

7. Make Muffin Words

Just the sight of this word work activity will have your students excited and ready to play. To prep this activity, write words on cupcake liners and place a liner in each spot in a muffin tin. Students will toss a small ball or dot cube into the muffin tin. They'll read the word they landed on, and if correct, they get to keep the word. If they don't read it correctly, the word stays in the muffin tin.

After all of the words have been removed, the player with the most words at the end of the game is the winner. You can practice sight words, word family words, words with blends or digraphs, etc.

To practice phoneme substitution with CVC words, you could have the students change a sound to make a new word. You can also write a word family on the cupcake liners and have students say any word in that word family. The options are endless!

8. Paint Strip Puzzles

This word work activity requires nothing more than paint strips that you can snag (usually for free) from your local hardware store. Write words on the paint strip, placing one letter in each space. In one space, write the entire word. Most paint strips have 6 spaces, so this is a great way to work on larger words, such as CVCe words, words with blends or digraphs, or sight words.

You can trim the paint strips as needed if you don't use every space. Next, cut the paint strip so the letters and word are separated. Mix them up and have students build the word, putting the pieces back together like a puzzle. For easy storage, write the word of focus on the outside of a snack-size baggie and store the pieces inside.

I hope you're excited to implement these fun and simple-to-prep word work activities into your classroom. With repetition and practice, your students will be growing their skills and becoming young readers in no time!

Free CVC Activities

Tips For Teaching CVC Words

While teaching CVC words is a big deal in kindergarten, getting there can be a challenge for some students. They need practice and repeated exposure to master this critical skill.

As a teacher, you know that the more hands-on, interactive activities you use, the more your students will be actively engaged. And higher engagement leads to more growth and success!

So before we dive into all of the activities for CVC words, let's first talk about some tips for teaching CVC words.

Tip #1: Know when your students are ready for CVC words.

Here's the thing… even though your kindergarten pacing guide might say that you need to be teaching CVC words at a certain time of year, if your students aren't ready, it's better to hold off.

To learn more about the signs of CVC word readiness, check out this blog post.

If your students are not quite ready for CVC words, that's ok! Keep working on the basics of letter recognition and letter sounds.

Tip #2: Provide multiple opportunities to work with CVC words.

Let's face it, students don't have a super long attention span. They also get bored easily doing the same activities for CVC words every day.

That's why it is so important to provide multiple opportunities for them to work with CVC words in different ways.

Additionally, all students have different learning styles. What clicks for one student may not for the next.

Therefore, it is a good idea to incorporate activities that use pictures, letters, hands-on CVC manipulatives, and even a word work station into your CVC word practice.

Tip #3: Use pictures that are clear and kid-friendly.

Speaking of activities for CVC words that use pictures, it is essential that the pictures are clear and kid-friendly. Students should be able to look at the picture and know exactly what the word is.

This will help avoid any confusion and give students more success as they work independently.

Tip #4: Practice, practice, practice!

Just like the old saying goes, practice makes perfect! And not just practice every once in a while, but daily CVC word practice.

You can add CVC work into your morning routine, carpet time, reading warm-ups, mini lessons, word work, CVC literacy centers, writing lessons, etc.

If you have a few minutes before lunch or the bell rings for the end of the day, you can go around the room and practice spelling and saying CVC words or saying CVC words in the same word family.

There are so many ways to practice, and they don't have to be time-consuming or complicated!

Activities for CVC Words

There are so many ways to practice CVC words, and luckily, many of them are easy to prep and use basic classroom supplies. There is so much you can do with plastic cubes, magnetic letters, dice, and mini erasers.

Word Family Activities

When students are practicing CVC words, it is helpful for them to work with the same word family. This helps them master that particular sound and get a lot of great repetition.

Using word family activities such as match and cover, CVC graphing, and CVC word mats are a great way to give students hands-on practice as they master CVC words and word families.

Build a Word Family

For a simple and no-prep word family activity, you can use magnetic letters to build words in the same word family.

Give students a pile of magnetic letters. You can either call out words in the word family for them to build or give them a stack of word family cards to flip and build.

Write a Word Family

If you're looking for an easy way to get students active, you can do this write a word family activity.

To begin, write a word family on the whiteboard. Have students take turns writing a word that belongs in the word family on the board.

This would be a great whole group warm-up or mini-lesson activity.

Mixed Vowel CVC Activities

As students progress with their CVC skills, you can start to incorporate activities for CVC words that use mixed vowels.

CVC word searches, roll and read, and spell it are all great ways to practice identifying and reading words with different middle vowels.

Word Family Mix Up

Another fun and DIY way to practice CVC words in various word families is to play word family mix up.

Draw a simple T-chart on a whiteboard or chart paper. Write various word families on the top of the chart. Write different CVC words in the various word families on notecards and mix them up.

Have students take turns drawing a card, reading the word, and writing the word under the correct word family on the chart.

You can also play by mixing up all the cards face up. Call out a word family and have students take turns finding a word card in that word family. Then they will write it under the correct word family on the board.

This is a great whole group or small group game to practice CVC words.

CVC Bundle Sampler Freebie

Since you can never have too many activities for CVC words, I have just the freebie for you! You can try a free sampler of my CVC Words Bundle by filling out the form below.

It'll get delivered straight to your inbox with a sample of several of the activities included in the bundle for you and your students to try!

I hope these activities and tips for teaching CVC words have been helpful and make learning more fun for your students!

Scaffold the Learning Between Short and Long Vowels

When you begin teaching CVCe words in kindergarten, it's important to scaffold the learning. Help students connect the previously taught skill of using short vowels in CVC words to the new skill of using long vowels in CVCe words. This will help them naturally build on prior knowledge to expand their learning and grasp this literacy concept.

Tip #1: Compare CVC and CVCe words.

One strategy you can use to scaffold the learning and introduce CVCe words is to compare CVC and CVCe words. Write a CVC word on the whiteboard or on chart paper. Have students read and identify the word. Next to the word, write the same CVC word, except this time, add the silent e to make it a CVCe word. For example: kit—>kite.

Practice saying the CVCe word together. Reinforce the rule that the silent e makes no sound and tells the vowel to say its name. This strategy helps students understand the difference in short and long vowel sounds. This is an effective whole group or small group activity.

To help students further understand the impact that the silent e has on words, they can draw a picture of the CVC and CVCe word. This will help them see visually how the silent e makes it a completely different word. 

Tip #2: Use visual aids.

Using visual aids when teaching CVCe words in kindergarten is another effective strategy. This helps students read CVCe words and understand the relationship between the silent e and long vowel sounds. To add a visual and hands-on element to your CVCe lessons, draw simple CVCe pictures on notecards. You can also use CVCe picture cards that you have in your classroom. 

Students will draw a picture card, identify the CVCe word, and build the word next to the card using magnetic letters, creating their own CVCe word mat. It's helpful to use the red and blue magnetic letters that represent vowels and consonants. This allows students see the 2 vowels in each CVCe word and remember that the silent e tells the first vowel to say its name.

You can also have students write the words on a whiteboard instead of building them with magnetic letters. They can write the word and underline the vowels in the word to identify them. If you have access to technology, students can practice building words digitally with CVCe Boom Cards.

Work on One Long Vowel Sound at a Time

When you begin teaching CVCe words in kindergarten, it's important to teach one long vowel sound at a time. This will help reduce the overwhelm and confusion for students. It will also allow them to become familiar with each long vowel sound before moving on to the next. 

Tip #3: Draw a graphic organizer.

Graphic organizers are a great way to help students practice reading words with each long vowel sound. Draw a simple idea web graphic organizer on the whiteboard or chart paper. Draw one large circle in the middle with several smaller circles attached to it, like a web. Write one long vowel in the middle.

Encourage students to brainstorm words that have that long vowel sound. You can give examples or hand out CVCe picture cards using that vowel sound to help them. Students will take turns coming up to the whiteboard and writing a CVCe word with that long vowel sound in the graphic organizer.

Encourage the class to see how many words they can come up with. Repeat this activity for each of the long vowel sounds in the beginning stages of teaching CVCe words in kindergarten. Another way to do this activity is to write various CVCe words on sticky notes and have students stick the correct long vowel sound words onto the graphic organizer. 

Tip #4: Make a T-chart.

Another way to work on long vowel sounds is by making a simple T-chart. This will help students compare and sort words depending on their long vowel sound. You can draw a T-chart on the whiteboard, chart paper, or make a chart on the carpet using yard sticks to divide each column. Make sure there's a column for each long vowel sound that you're focusing on and a line across the top.

Write or use notecards to label each column with a long vowel. You can work on comparing 2 vowel sounds up to 4 long vowel sounds. Using the picture notecards or picture cards from the previous activity, have students take turns drawing a picture card, saying the word, and placing it under the correct vowel column to match the CVCe word to the correct long vowel sound.

Teach CVCe Words With Rhyming

Rhyming is a key kindergarten literacy skill that helps students make connections between word patterns and word families. Using rhyming to teach CVCe words is an effective way for students to learn the CVCe word pattern and practice reading words with long vowels and the silent e. 

Tip #5: Match CVCe rhyming words. 

When students apply rhyming skills to CVCe words, they're able to hear the long vowel sound pattern. This helps them come up with new CVCe words. To use rhyming to reinforce CVCe words, write CVCe rhyming words on notecards. For example: rake and bake; mine and fine. Mix up the cards and have students work together to match the correct CVCe rhyming pairs.

This is a great activity for small groups or CVCe literacy centers. You can easily differentiate by working on 1 long vowel sound at a time or including several long vowel word pairs to offer more of a challenge. 

Tip #6: Play whole group CVCe Bingo.

Another fun way to teach CVCe words with rhyming is by playing Bingo. To prep, draw a basic Bingo board on the whiteboard. You can make it as big or small as you'd like. A 5 X 5 square board is a good size to start with. Write CVCe words with mixed vowel sounds in the spaces on the board. Write rhyming CVCe words on sticky notes. 

To play, students will take turns drawing a sticky note and finding the matching rhyming word on the board and sticking it to cover the word. Play continues until the class has found a bingo. You can easily play this game multiple times by writing different words on the Bingo board and on the sticky notes. 

I hope these tips for teaching CVCe words in kindergarten have left you feeling more confident about teaching this literacy skill. If you liked the activities found in this blog post, you can find them along with other printable and digital activities in my CVCe Words Bundle. 

Word Building Resources

1. Magnetic Letters

Magnetic letters are a versatile manipulative for teaching CVC words. They can be used for a variety of activities, such as CVC Sound Mazes, or on their own to practice building words. The different colors for consonants and vowels helps students distinguish the differences in letters and short vowel sounds.

2. Word Building Spinners

Another fun word-building manipulative for kindergarteners is word spinners These neat little wheels help students learn to quickly read and spell CVC words as they spin the blocks to make new words. Picture cards are included as well. These are so great for practicing beginning and ending phoneme substitution.

3. Play Dough

Any kindergarten teacher will tell you that play dough is a classroom staple, so of course it makes the list! Play dough helps strengthen fine motor skills, but did you know it can also strengthen phonics skills? Yes, it's true! Using play dough to build letters and words improves both. Students roll the dough into long snakes to form words or use letter stamps.

Letter Manipulatives

4. Letter Tiles

Letter tiles are extremely versatile when it comes to practicing letters and sounds and decoding CVC words. Students can use these to build words, practice manipulating letters, and more. To keep practice fresh, these are an alternative to magnetic letters.

5. Pop Boards

Your tactile learners will love these. These CVC pop boards combine those famous “pop it” toys with word building. Students pop each bubble as they say the letter sound and then blend the word. These make great morning tub activities.

6. Pocket Chart Letter Cards

The pocket chart center is one of the most popular centers in kindergarten. Pocket charts work well for sorting activities and word-building activities. These pocket chart pictures and letters come with a small pocket chart, but you could easily use a larger pocket chart that you already have in your classroom.

Fine Motor Activities

7. Plastic Spinners

Plastic spinners are probably one of my favorite learning tools. They are versatile because they can be used for math, literacy, games, and more. Plastic spinners take an ordinary activity and make it extraordinary, and engagement immediately goes up. I use these plastic spinners from Amazon. They were used in the Spin and Cover CVC Words image below.

8. Bingo Dabbers

This manipulative for teaching CVC words ranks right up there with play dough on my list of favorite classroom resources. Do a Dot bingo dabbers are my favorite brand. They can use them for various CVC bingo dabber activities, such as word family dab, real vs. nonsense word dab, and more. Be sure to teach your students how to use a bingo dabber by dabbing lightly and not pushing down for longer than a quick second!

Dice

13. Zingo Word Game

This last game for teaching CVC words is the perfect CHALLENGE for your advanced learners. Zingo is a fun word building game. Students will slide the Zinger, build a word using the letters and their word card, and try to be the first to fill their card up. There are 2 levels of difficulty for this game.

CVC word practice doesn't have to feel like a drag with the same activities over and over. Incorporating these games and manipulatives for teaching CVC words will infuse fresh learning opportunities into your literacy lessons and centers. Which of these are you going to use first? Comment below and let me know!

1. Build with magnetic letters.

The possibilities of building CVC words with magnet letters are endless. A set of lowercase magnetic letters is one of those must-have supplies when teaching CVC words.

Students can use them to build words or manipulate the sounds in words as they sharpen their skills. You'll notice a lot of my favorite activities use magnetic letters.

This set of magnetic letter mats includes over 50 practice mats. They provide practice grouped by word families, by vowel, and mixed practice – which means they are great for differentiating instruction. It's part of our big CVC Bundle. 

6. Crack the code.

Secret code activities are a crowd favorite. Students have so much fun cracking the code that they don’t realize they are actually learning (and reviewing beginning sounds). 

Students identify the beginning sound of each picture to crack the code and spell a secret CVC word.  Then they have to read the word to match the CVC picture card to the secret code card. There is a beginning sound cheat-sheet included for students who need a little extra support. These cards are a fun way for students to practice and they make great morning tub activity.