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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Learn to Read Short I - Daily Phonics for Kids
Teach your students to read short I words with a daily digital phonics instructional slide deck.
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Jellyfishing for Sight Words - Kindergarten Sight Word Game
Go jellyfishing for Kindergarten Dolch words with an interactive Google Slides game!
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Gingerbread Vowels - Printable Vowels Worksheets
Use coloring and Christmas to engage your students with printable long and short vowel worksheets like these!
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Christmas Connect the Dots Printables - Alphabet
Practice ordering the alphabet by connecting the dots on printable Christmas dot-to-dot worksheets.
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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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Snow Globe Digraphs - Google Interactive
Bring some winter fun into your phonics lessons with an interactive Snowglobe Digraph activity.
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Word Study List - CCVC Words
Introduce and explore words containing the consonant-consonant-vowel-consonant pattern with this printable list of CCVC words.
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CVC Word List
Introduce and explore consonant-vowel-consonant words with this extensive list of CVC words.
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Thanksgiving Color by Code - Vowels
Use this color by vowel sound Thanksgiving worksheet as for a bit of Turkey Day fun in the classroom.
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Learn to Read Short E - Daily Phonics for Kids
Teach your students to read short /e/ CVC words with a daily digital phonics instructional slide deck.
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Pumpkin Patch Sight Words
Build reading fluency and practice reading and spelling Dolch sight words with a pumpkin word-building center.
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Which Letter? Poster - K or C
Help your students remember when to use the letter K and when to use the letter C with this colorful classroom poster.
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Which Sound? Poster - The Letter C
Remind your students of the different sounds made by the letter C with this colorful classroom poster.
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Which Sound? Poster - Soft G and Hard G Sounds
Remind your students of the different sounds made by the letter G with this colorful classroom poster.
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Which Letter? Worksheet - K or C
Practice identifying when to begin words with k vs. c with this printable two-page worksheet.
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Missing Letters - Pumpkin Task Cards
Fall into letter-sound correspondence with this pumpkin-themed missing letter task card set.
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Beginning Sound Clip Cards - Apple Themed Activity
Apply letter-sound correspondence and beginning word sounds with an apple-themed letter recognition game.
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Who Is Clara Barton? – Shared Reading and Activity
Build reading fluency with a 15-slide teaching deck about Clara Barton to use as a shared reading activity this Women's History Month!
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Thanksgiving Crafts – ABC and 123 Turkeys
A Thanksgiving activity for students to practice counting, skip counting, and the letters of the alphabet.
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Apple Activities - Short and Long Vowel Sort
Supplement your phonics lessons with an apple-themed initial sound sorting activity.
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Which Consonant Digraph Is It? Interactive Activity
Review consonant digraphs with this comprehensive drag-and-drop interactive activity.
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Consonant Digraphs - Interactive Sorting Activity
Practice identifying beginning and ending consonant digraphs with this interactive sorting activity.
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Consonant Digraph Clip Cards
Explore consonant digraphs at the beginning and end of words with these hands-on clip cards.
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Word Chain Worksheet - Final -st Blends
Create word chains by manipulating the individual phonemes in words with this differentiated word-building worksheet.
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Word Chain Worksheet - Beginning L Blends
Manipulate the individual phonemes in words to create new ones with this differentiated word-building worksheet.
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Magic E Wand and Word Cards
Create a crafty phonics activity to explore the power of the magic e in CVCe words.
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Short Vowel Worksheets (Middle Sounds Practice)
Identify medial or middle vowel sounds with this set of three worksheets.
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Magic E Words - Match-Up Activity
Explore words containing long vowel sounds created by the magic e.
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Meet Magic E - Poster and Worksheet Set
Remind your students how words are transformed by the magic e with this poster and worksheet set.
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Google Slides Alphabet Interactive - Letter N
Add hands-on literacy activities to your reading centers to help students identify, write, and learn the sound of the letter N.
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Alphabet Interactive - Letter M
Build letter recognition and phonemic awareness of the letter M with a Google Interactive Activity.
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Letter Craft Activity - 'M' is For Monster
An activity to assist young students with letter recognition, phonemic awareness and fine motor development.