How to help DS (reception) with blending sounds together?

[schneebly]

I am a little worried that DS is falling behind in his class as he knows the sounds of all the letters but struggles to put the sounds together to make the word - any ideas of how I can help him?

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Practice with short words, once he gets some of them more will cascade.

Does he know the ch, sh and th sounds? Because th as a sound they make in class is the same as "the", so it's a start!

Start with three sound words (commonly known as CVC or Consonant Vowel Consonant words). Say "Listen to the sounds and see if you can hear a word. C - a - t." Wait to see if he hears and says "cat". With practice, it will come. Point to the sounds in the word as you say them.

Once he can do this, try four sounds words.

The Jolly Word Book (in the Jolly Phonics range) costs about £2 and has lists of words in, or you can just think of your own.

HTH

just spotted these replied - thank you very much.

dd's teacher does 'robot arms' with the class, whereby they say the sound and move their arms up and down for each sound (eg c - raise and lower right arm, a - raise and lower left arm, t - raise and lower right arm), then they rub their hands together to blend the sounds together.
It sounds bizarre and the teacher is embarrassed if anyone grown up sees her doing it, but she can really get the class enthused and the kids really seem to get it.

I taught my son to say the letters using phonics immediately after each other and squeeze them together to get rid of the gap. 'it' was an 'i' and a 't', squash them together and it makes 'it'. It worked, did not take very long.

My DDs teacher does robot arms as well! As well as breaking down the words when she is speaking ie: 'Can you go and get your lunch b-o-x?' Does that make sense? My DD struggled at the beginning and then it just clicked which isn't very helpful I know but it will click!

lol and intruiged by the robot arms! will definitely try some of these things - thanks. x

Thanks for posting this one, my Dds just the same at the age of 5, but the teacher seems to be putting a lot of the pressure on me to do it, and implies that D is behind. Been very worried.

make sure that you're/he's not adding stray "uh" sounds onto the end of consonants - as obviously you can't blend cuh-ah-tuh into cat. And lots and lots of practise

yes, I was going to say what shrinking violet said - instead of 'muh' 'a' 'tuh' you should say 'mmmmm' 'a' and then a very short 't' sound, if that makes sense!

Also if he is having trouble, make it even easier. Instead of asking him to put D-O-G together, ask him to put DO and G together DO - G. Hope some of that makes sense.

Oh and the most important thing - don't worry, this is perfectly normal, he will get there in the end! He's only in reception, lots of kids don't really grasp it until Y1 (and remember across europe kids don't even start proper school until age 7 or something - at 4 and 5 they are still playing)