🐸 Phoneme Segmenting + Movement Activity

In this fun phoneme segmenting activity, students will jump on lily pads to practice their phoneme segmentation skills. Each jump on a lily pad represents a single phoneme they can hear in a word. Incorporating movement into this type of activity can be beneficial for the following reasons:

• Engage multiple senses, including sight, sound, and touch. This multisensory approach can help students better understand and remember the phonemes they are working with.
• It helps with attention and focus, as it helps students release excess energy and improve their attention and focus.
• It makes learning fun! These fun movement activities almost feel like children are just playing rather than practicing a skill—and that’s a win-win!
• Movement activities support whole-child development, engaging students in physical, cognitive, and social-emotional development. 

How to Play

Materials:

• Large lily pad cutouts (laminated for durability)
• Word card sets (2 phonemes, 3 phonemes, and 4 phonemes)

Instructions:

1. Introduce the activity to the students and explain that they will be practicing their phoneme segmentation skills.
2. Place the lily pads on the floor in a path, leaving enough space between each pad for the students to jump.
3. Show the students a word card.
4. Explain that they will need to listen carefully to the word and jump on a lily pad for each sound they hear in the word (e.g., cat – /k/ /a/ /t/ = three jumps.
5. Have the students say the word out loud, then jump on a lily pad for each phoneme they hear.
6. Continue with different word cards, adjusting the level of difficulty as needed.
7. Encourage the students to say the phonemes out loud as they jump on each lily pad.

Download & Print — It’s Child’s Play! 

Use the drop-down menu to choose between the PDF and editable Google Slide versions of this resource. It’s recommended you print the task cards on cardstock for added durability. Due to the nature of kids ‘jumping’ on the lily pads, you should laminate just the lily pads so that they don’t get ruined as the students jump on them. 

Hot tip: If you’re lucky enough to have a non-slip area or art area in your classroom, you might like to use clear contact to stick the lily pads to the ground for a more permanent activity (these can be used for so many activities).

This resource was created by Samantha Rose, a teacher in Florida and a Teach Starter collaborator.