Looking for a fun way to practice word families?! This is one of our all time favorites! Children have a blast sounding out and writing words as they count down from 10 to Takeoff.
Word Rocket is the perfect complement to our Editable Word Work Games where you can practice any words under the sun!
Getting Ready
To prep, I first gathered our supplies:
- Word Rocket printable  (available here).
- 3 blank wooden blocks. (I grabbed ours in the craft section.)
- A sheet of dot stickers.
- Two different colored markers.
The first item on my to-do list was making the game dice: two with consonants and one with vowels.
I simply wrote one letter on each of the dot stickers.  You’ll need twelve consonant letters like the ones written on the yellow and green dots pictured (below).  My favorite consonants are [c, d, t, l, m, p, r, n, b, g, h, s] because they make so many words but you could choose anything.
I attached one of the consonant dots to each of the sides on two of the dice.
To make the last die, I used a different colored marker to write six vowel letters like those written on the pink dots (above).  Vowels are the letters [a, e, i, o, u and sometimes y].  Using a different colored marker would help children quickly identify those letters as vowels.
You may have noticed that I intentionally wrote the vowel [a] twice. Â [Y] is not used in enough words to make it worth including here so I left it out and replaced it with a second [a].
And, although it’s not pictured, you will need a [u] dot too.
Word Rocket
Whew!  Now it was time to play!  Children rolled all three dice and used the letters that landed on top to try and make a word.  This first combination didn’t work….
But when the first and last letters were switched, the letters spelled the word “can”.
When the letters made a real word, students wrote it down on the Word Rocket printable HERE.
If they didn’t make a real word using the letters rolled, kids simply picked up the dice and rolled them again.
Each time they wrote a new word on their rocket, they moved one step closer to the finish line – appropriately called “takeoff”.
3, 2, 1…. PLAY!
Must Try Word Activities
Save time hunting down fun word games by grabbing our Editable Word Work Activities in our shop!
Seriously- We are DOING this tomorrow. Going to Hobby Lobby to get the blocks! Our 4.5 year old daughter surprised me today with her first unassisted poem along the lines of “CAT MAT HAT, CAT FAT HAT MAT…” but it’s a great start. 🙂 The blocks will help a lot! Thanks!
Yay! I’m glad that you found a new activity to try with your daughter.
Another idea…We’re getting ready for a long road trip/vacation- We can’t take a ton of materials/toys with us- but this will save space!
That is SUCH a great idea!
Thanks for the great (and easy) game idea. My daughter would have fun with this. And because you’re using stickers, if you don’t have blank dice you can just cover regular ones.
Using regular dice is a brilliant idea, Debs!
Just wanted to let you know that when I complete my post on our version of these, I will cite yours! Totally going to come in handy on our road trip- I’ll be homeschooling for three months while we are away- these will be fab! Thanks!
Thanks Tricia! I’m excited to see your post and I hope you have a wonderful road trip.
Hi Malia! We just loved this game and featured it at our blog, Kindergarten Lesson Plans!
You can find the full feature here:
http://kindergartenlessonplans.org/2043/word-rocket-spelling-writing-counting/
We were sure to give idea/photo credit, as well as a link back to your site, but we’d love for you to check it out!
Have a wonderful day,
Kayla
Aw, thank you Kayla!! That makes my day. I’ll come over and check it out now. 🙂
Wonderful idea, I will use this with my tutoring students!
Hooray Dite! I’m happy to hear that the word rocket is helpful. 🙂