Simplify phonemic awareness with this versatile tool
Students must master many skills before they are able to become fluent readers including the ability to hear and manipulate individual sounds in words (also called “phonemic awareness”). But what’s the best way to teach phonemic awareness? Sound boxes! Also known as Elkonin boxes, the strategy helps students strengthen pre-reading skills by helping them identify and replace individual sounds (called phonemes) in words.
This mega pack of 114 sound boxes is one of our top sellers – and for good reason! The print-and-go activity is a playful, hands-on way to practice sounding out common 2, 3 and 4 phoneme words like AT, SAT, and STAT.
Grab your set below and then join the priority list for our VIP teaching membership, The Science of Reading Formula, so you can unlock access to all of our teaching tools (including more of these!) in one time-saving spot.
Sound Box Prep
To prep the Elkonin Boxes, simply print the cards on cardstock, cut along the lines to separate the pieces, and slide them through the laminator to give them extra durability and make them reusable.
The mega pack of sound boxes includes 114 different cards showing words with two, three, and four phonemes so you can pick the version that is the best fit for your class.
(While learning phonemic awareness can be challenging for students, we believe that getting ready to teach phonemic awareness should be simple.)
Sound Boxes
The activity is great to use for small reading groups, literacy centers, or independent practice. The steps are the same but, for this example, let’s pretend that you are working with a small reading group and grabbed the pile of three phoneme words like DOG and CAT.
When a student volunteer flips over the word “run”, they will say the word aloud, and then tap the sounds in each sound box as they say the individual sounds again like this:
“/R/” (taps the first square), “/u/” (taps the second square), “/n/” (taps the third square), “run” (slides their finger along the arrow as they blend the sounds together to read the word).
Students will continue working through the stack of cards until they complete the pile.
Extension Ideas
One of the many great things about using sound boxes to teach phonemic awareness is the ability to modify and adapt the activity to meet the needs of ALL of your students.
Here are a couple of simple tweaks you can make when students are ready to take their learning up a notch:
- Have a student say the word out loud. Then name one of the sounds – either the beginning, middle or end. Ask the student to slide a manipulative into the box where she hears that sound. For instance, in the RUN example above, if you name the /n/ sound, she would slide one manipulative into the third box.
- Add an extra challenge by having students swap out one of the sounds in a word with a different sound. For instance, ask students to change the /r/ sound in RUN to /b/, making the word “bun”.
Ready for more word fun? Grab the best selling Editable Sight Word Games in our shop or inside of our VIP teaching membership, the Science of Reading Formula. There are TONS of print-and-go resources just like this one waiting for you inside
Grab Your Pack
Snag your pack of 114 Elkonin boxes on Teachers Pay Teachers! Then, join the waitlist for our VIP teaching membership, the Science of Reading Formula.
