Simple & Fun Phonics Activities & Games for Kids

Phonics activities are among the most effective ways to teach phonics at home. By engaging in fun phonics games and exercises, kids can learn to recognize letter sounds, blend and segment sounds, and improve their reading fluency—all while having fun! 

In this guide, we’ll explore various phonics activities for kids, including games for preschoolers, kindergarteners, 1st graders, and 2nd graders. We’ll also share some of our favorite multisensory phonics activities and tips for turning several games below into outdoor activities!

Ready to check out some fun, simple, and hands-on phonics activities? Let’s dive in!

Content Quick Links:

Phonics Recap

Phonics Activities & Games

• Toddlers
• Preschoolers
• Kindergarteners
• 1st Graders
• 2nd Graders

Make Phonics Fun with Booka

Quick Phonics Recap

Before we dive into phonics activities, here’s a quick review of the most important things to know when teaching phonics at home.

Want to learn more about how to teach phonics to your child? Check out our in-depth guide on Teaching Phonics at Home.

Phonics Meaning

Phonics teaches kids how to connect letters and groups of letters (graphemes) with their individual sounds (phonemes). 

Why is phonics important?

Phonics is important because it enables kids to decode words by recognizing patterns and blending sounds - instead of just memorizing words. As a result, phonics knowledge enhances reading fluency and comprehension, gives kids the confidence to read independently, and provides a strong foundation for spelling and writing skills.

Key Skills

Some of the most important phonics skills that young readers need to learn include:

• Letter-sound recognition - i.e., the ability to identify the sound that each letter or group of letters makes

• Blending - i.e., the ability to combine individual sounds to form words

• Segmenting - i.e., the ability to segment words into individual sounds

• Digraphs, trigraphs, diphthongs, and blends - i.e., the ability to recognize the sounds made by particular groups of letters

• Silent letters and phonics rules - i.e., the ability to understand spelling patterns, like silent e or magic e words and other phonics rules

• Decoding - i.e., the ability to decode unfamiliar words by applying phonics knowledge

What are phonics activities?

Phonics activities are interactive exercises that help children learn and practice the relationship between letters and their sounds. Phonics games and activities are among the best, easiest, and most fun ways to teach phonics at home. Best of all, hands-on activities can help enhance skill development and retention.

Now, let’s look at some great games and activities for toddlers, preschoolers, kindergarteners, and kids in grade 1 and grade 2.

Fun Phonics Activities & Games (By Grade Level/Age)

Below are the best fun, hands-on phonics activities and games for kids. To make it easier to find activities suitable for your child, we’ve organized the games and activities below by grade/age level.

It’s important to note that all children learn at their own pace. So, please choose activities based on your child’s level and unique learning needs.

Phonics Games for Toddlers (Ages 1 - 3)

Toddlers are just beginning to recognize sounds and associate them with letters. Therefore, engaging, simple, hands-on activities are the best way to help introduce phonics at this stage. 

These practical phonics activities and games for toddlers focus on sound awareness, letter recognition, and early word building.

Letter Sound Peek-a-Boo

This simple game introduces letters and their sounds in a fun, interactive way.

What You’ll Need:

• Large index cards with a single letter written on each

How to Play:

1. Hold up a letter card and cover it with your hand.
2. Slowly reveal it while saying the letter name and the sound it makes (e.g., “Peek-a-boo! It’s ‘B’! ‘B’ says /b/!”).
3. Encourage your child to repeat the sound after you.
4. Play again with a new letter.

This toddler phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Letter names
• Letter-sound recognition

Alphabet Sound Hop

This movement-based phonics game helps toddlers associate letters with their sounds while staying active.

What You’ll Need:

• Large letter cards (or paper or sticky notes with letters written on them)
• Tape (to secure the letter cards to the floor)

How to Play:

1. Place the letter cards on the floor in a scattered pattern.
2. Call out a sound (e.g., “Find the letter that makes the /m/ sound!”).
3. Encourage your toddler to point to (or hop onto - if the letter cards are securely fastened to the floor) the correct letter.
4. Say the sound together and try naming words that start with that sound.

This exercise helps promote the following phonics skills:

• Letter-sound recognition

MAKE IT AN OUTDOOR PHONICS ACTIVITY: Want to take this fun phonics game outside? Just grab some sidewalk chalk and draw letters on the pavement, or adhere your large letter cards to the ground outside. Learning in nature is fun and can enhance academic performance, critical thinking, and mental and physical health!

Book Time with Letter Sounds

Reading simple books while emphasizing letter sounds can help build early phonics skills. We love this phonics activity because it combines learning with one-on-one bonding time!

What You’ll Need:

• A book (print or eBook) with large letters or simple words

How to Play:

1. Open a book and point to a letter.
2. Say the letter’s name and sound (e.g., “‘B’ says /b/ like “bear”!”).
3. Encourage your toddler to point to and say the letter and its name.

This phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Letter awareness
• Letter-sound recognition

PRO TIPS:

• Keep sessions short and use engaging books about topics your child is interested in.
• Consider using a reading app for kids, like Booka, to access hundreds of stories on various topics - all in one place. This will prevent you from needing to constantly buy new print books when a story gets old or your child’s phonics and reading skills improve.

Phonics Activities for Preschoolers (Ages 3 - 5)

Preschool (Reception or Year R, Junior KG, KG1) is the perfect time to help your child master letter names, letter-sound recognition, and the ability to form simple words using individual sounds. Therefore, these preschool phonics activities focus on building those skills in a fun, hands-on way.

Letter Sound Sorting

This hands-on phonics game for preschoolers helps children learn to connect letters with their individual sounds.

What You’ll Need:

• 2 to 4 small bins or containers
• 2 to 4 large letter cards (e.g., ‘B,’ ‘C,’ ‘D,’ ‘S’)
• Small objects or pictures that start with those sounds (e.g., ball, banana, cat, car, doll, dog, stick, sun)

How to Play:

1. Place a different letter card in each bin or container.
2. Show your child each letter card and say its name and sound (e.g., “‘B’ says /b/, ‘C’ says /k/, ‘D’ says /d/, ‘S’ says /s/”).
3. Hold up an object (e.g., a ball) and ask, “Which bin does this go in?”
4. Say the sound together before placing it in the correct bin.

This phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Letter recognition
• Letter-sound recognition
• Vocabulary building

Phonics eBook Treasure Hunt

This interactive phonics game for preschoolers uses digital eBooks to help teach letter and letter-sound recognition and build early reading skills.

What You’ll Need:

• A digital book with simple words 

TIP: Download Booka for quick and easy access to phonics-friendly books for preschoolers.

• A device (tablet, phone, or computer) to read the eBook
• A printed or digital letter checklist (optional)

How to Play:

1. Choose an age-appropriate eBook on Booka (or another children’s reading app) that features simple words with clear letter sounds.
2. Before reading, pick a few target letters or sounds (e.g., “We’re going to find words that start with ‘S’ and ‘B’ today!”).
3. Start reading the book together, and ask your child to listen for the target sounds.
4. When they hear a word starting with the target sound, have them point to it on the screen or repeat the word aloud (e.g., “Sun! That starts with ‘S’!”).

LEVEL UP: For an added challenge, create a checklist your child can use to mark off the letters or words they hear.

This phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Letter-sound recognition
• Early word recognition
• Listening comprehension

Sensory Letter Hunt

This fun phonics activity for preschoolers introduces letter shapes and sounds through sensory play. It’s one of our favorite phonics games because of the multisensory aspect, and it’s especially great for kids who like to keep busy while they learn!

What You’ll Need:

• A small bin filled with sand, rice, or dried beans
• Plastic or foam letters (or homemade paper letter cutouts)

How to Play:

1. Hide the letters in the sensory bin.
2. Have your child dig and pull out one letter at a time.
3. Ask your child to say the letter’s name and sound (e.g., “This is ‘C’! It makes the /k/ sound”).
4. Encourage your child to repeat the sound and find an object nearby that starts with the same sound.

This phonics game promotes the following skills:

• Letter recognition
• Letter-sound association

MAKE IT AN OUTDOOR PHONICS ACTIVITY: Turn this phonics game into an outdoor activity by hiding the plastic or foam letters in a sandbox! Alternatively, hide the letters around your yard.

Phonics Activities for Kindergarten (Ages 5 - 6)

Children ages 5 to 6 typically become more confident in recognizing letters, blending sounds, and reading simple words. Therefore, these fun phonics activities for kindergarten (Year 1, Senior KG, KG2) focus on blending, segmenting, and building words.

Build-a-Word with Letter Blocks

This fun, hands-on activity helps children practice blending sounds and forming simple words.

What You’ll Need:

• Letter blocks, magnetic letters, letter tiles, or letters cut out from paper
• A magnetic board or flat surface

How to Play:

1. Spread the letter on a table.
2. Say a simple word (e.g., “cat”) and have your child find the letters to build it.
3. Help them sound out each letter as they place it.
4. Mix up the letters and try again with a new word.

LEVEL UP: For an extra challenge, ask your child to swap the first or last letter of a word they’ve built to create a new word (e.g., "cat" → "bat" → "hat").

This phonics game promotes the following skills:

• Letter recognition
• Blending sounds
• Word formation

Storytime Sound Swap

This phonics activity helps kids in kindergarten practice recognizing and changing beginning sounds to form new words.

What You’ll Need:

• A simple decodable book
• A marker and paper (optional)

How to Play:

1. Read a simple sentence from the book aloud (e.g., “The cat wore a hat”).
2. Choose a word and change the first letter sound (e.g., “What if the ‘c’ in “cat” changed to ‘b’? What new word do we get?”). Point to the letter to reinforce letter-sound recognition.
3. Let your child come up with different beginning sounds to create new words.
4. Write down the new words and read them together.

This phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Letter-sound recognition
• Blending sounds
• Beginning sound substitution
• Word recognition

Secret Words (with Invisible Ink)

This activity requires more supplies than others but is super exciting and magical for kids. Therefore, it’s one of the best (and our personal favorite) hands-on phonics activities for year 1/kindergarten.

What You’ll Need:

• White crayon or white candle
• White paper
• Watercolor paint or markers

How to Play:

1. Write simple words (e.g., “cat,” “sun,” “dog”) on a piece of paper with a white crayon or white candle.
2. Have your child paint over the paper with watercolors to reveal the hidden words.
3. Ask them to read each word aloud and say the letter sounds.

This phonics game promotes the following skills:

• Letter-sound recognition
• Word decoding

Phonics Activities for 1st Grade (Ages 6 - 7)

By 1st grade (Year 2, Class I), children are developing stronger phonics skills, including blending sounds, decoding words, and recognizing spelling patterns. Thus, these practical phonics activities for kids help reinforce segmenting, blending, decoding, and word formation.

Word Ladder Challenge

This activity helps children in grade 1 practice changing one letter sound at a time to create new words.

What You’ll Need:

• A whiteboard or piece of paper
• A whiteboard marker or pencil

How to Play:

1. Write a word at the bottom of a whiteboard or piece of paper (e.g., “bay”).
2. Ask your child to change one letter in the word to make a new word (e.g., “bay” → “pay”), writing the new word above the original (to make a ladder).
3. Have them continue until they run out of ideas. 
4. When they’re done, read the words aloud together to reinforce their sounds.

This phonics game promotes the following skills:

• Letter-sound manipulation
• Word decoding
• Spelling patterns

Sound Search (Using a Digital or Print Book)

This phonics activity for 1st grade uses books to reinforce letter-sound patterns. Of course, children in grade one have more advanced phonics skills. So, rather than simple sounds, this game focuses on digraphs and blends.

What You’ll Need:

• An eBook or print book with simple words. 

Download the Booka reading app for easy access to hundreds of stories.

• A list of target sounds or spelling patterns (e.g., ‘sh,’ ‘ch,’ “-ing”).

How to Play:

1. Choose an age-appropriate book with decodable words.
2. Before reading, pick a target sound or word pattern from the list (e.g., “Let’s find all the words with ‘sh’!”).
3. As they read out loud (with your help, if needed), have your child point out the words that contain the target sound. Keep a tally to see which sounds appear the most!
4. At the end, review the list of words and read them together.

This phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Digraph and blend pattern and sound recognition
• Decoding
• Reading fluency

Spin & Read Blending Game

This activity is a hands-on way to practice blending phonemes into complete words. Like the “Secret Words” activity for kindergartners, this phonics game is a bit more complex to set up. However, its interactive, multisensory nature makes it one of the best phonics activities for 1st grade.

What You’ll Need:

• A paper plate or cardboard circle
• A split-pin fastener
• A strip of paper for a spinner
• A marker

How to Play:

1. Divide the paper plate into sections and write different beginning sounds (e.g., ‘B’ - /b/, ‘C’ - /k/, ‘D’ - /d/).
2. Attach a spinner to the center of the plate.
3. On another strip of paper, write common word endings like "-at," "-og," or "-in."
4. Have your child spin the wheel and blend the beginning sound with the word ending to create a word (e.g., ‘B’ + ‘at’ = “bat”).

This phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Blending phonemes
• Word recognition
• Fluency building

Phonics Games for 2nd Grade (Ages 7 - 8)

By grade 2, children are working on advanced phonics skills such as vowel teams, digraphs, diphthongs, silent letters, and decoding longer words. Therefore, these free phonics games for 2nd grade (Year 3, Class II) focus on reinforcing spelling patterns, word decoding, and fluency.

Story Builder

This phonics activity encourages children to apply their phonics skills by creating and extending sentences based on words they find in books.

Before you begin, download a children’s book app like Booka, so you have access to plenty of stories!

What You’ll Need:

• A digital eBook or printed book with phonics-friendly words
• Index cards or a notepad
• A marker or pen

How to Play:

1. Choose a just right book with clear, decodable words.
2. As your child reads aloud, ask them to point out words that follow specific phonics rules like silent e (e.g., “cake”), short vowels (e.g., short ‘i’ in “sit”), vowel teams (e.g., 'ai' in "rain”), consonant blends (e.g., ‘cr’ in "crab”), etc.
3. Write (or have them write) the word on an index card.
4. Challenge your child to build a new sentence using that word.

LEVEL UP: Keep adding new words and sentences to create a short story! At the end, read the story together and highlight the phonics patterns used.

This 2nd grade phonics activity promotes the following skills:

• Recognizing and understanding phonics rules
• Word decoding
• Sentence construction
• Reading comprehension and fluency
• Imagination and creativity

Phonics Bingo

This phonics game is a fun way to reinforce different phonics patterns in a game format.

What You’ll Need:

• Bingo boards with phonics words instead of numbers
• Small counters or stickers

How to Play:

1. Create Bingo boards with words containing different phonics patterns (e.g., “boat,” “train,” “sight”).
2. Call out a phonics rule (e.g., “Find a word with the ‘oa’ sound!”).
3. Have your child (and all other players) cover a word that fits the rule.
4. The first to get three in a row wins!

PRO TIP: When it comes to Bingo, the more the merrier! So, get the whole family involved in this phonics activity. For an extra fun and competitive experience, you could even introduce prizes.

This activity promotes the following skills:

• Phonics pattern recognition
• Word decoding
• Listening skills

Phonics Relay Race

This active, outdoor phonics activity gets kids moving while reinforcing letter sounds and word building.

What You’ll Need:

• Chalk (if playing on pavement) or letter flashcards (if playing in a yard)
• Small objects or bean bags
• A start and finish line

How to Play:

1. Write words with common phonics patterns and rules (e.g., ‘sh’ - “ship,” ‘oa’ - “boat,” ‘ee’ - “bee”) on the ground using chalk or spread-out flashcards in an open space.
2. Stand at the start line with your child, along with some small objects (like bean bags) they can use as markers.
3. Call out a letter sound or phonics rule (e.g., "Find a word with 'ee'!").
4. Have your child run to the correct word, place the object on it, and say it aloud.
5. If they get it right, they run back, and you call out a new sound or rule.
6. Repeat until all the words are covered.

Have more than one child with similar phonics skills? Make this phonics game a head-to-head race!

This activity promotes the following skills:

• Letter-sound recognition
• Phonics pattern identification
• Blending and segmenting words
• Gross motor movement and engagement

Make Phonics Fun with Booka!

Phonics activities and games are a great way to help your child build strong reading skills—but you don’t have to do it alone! Booka simplifies phonics learning by offering a vast library of engaging, phonics-friendly books to support early readers.

With Booka, your child can:

• Explore phonics-focused stories that reinforce letter sounds and word patterns.
• Practice decoding and blending with the help of engaging books on topics your child will love.
• Build confidence and reading fluency with books designed for early readers.

Want to make phonics fun and simple?