Phoneme Practice Postcards

What You Do:

1. Collect a “sound bank” of vowel patterns. Some examples could be:
   • Ow—town, about, mouth, sound, loud, our
   • Oy—boy, noisy, joy, toy
   • Ar—shark, party, bark, mark, park
   • Ear—hear, sheer, steer, deer, fear, near
   • U—brook, look, shook, wood, put
2. Pick one set of vowel patterns. For this example, the "ow" vowel pattern (town, about, mouth sound, loud, our) will be used.
3. Work with your child to write a short message or story onto a 4" x 6” index card—one sentence is just fine to start—that uses as many words as possible from that group. For example: "Our Aunt Sally took us on a train ride. The sound of the beachside town we traveled to was loud. She told us about the legend of the mouth of the river that made this destination famous."
4. If your child can handle the writing, have him write the message on one side of the 4" x 6” index card. If not, it's fine to write for him for now, but do invite him to do this important final step: take a highlighter and highlight every word that includes an “ow” sound!
5. Turn the card over, and invite your child to draw a picture on the front to illustrate the message. To protect the picture, cover it with a sheet of clear plastic contact paper, trimmed neatly to the edge of the card.
6. When you're done, send it off, and don't hesitate to keep writing more!