What's Your Name?

For kindergartners who need practice in phonics.

To help young children learn to identify letters and spelling patterns and the sounds they represent, begin with something they know—their own name. Provide kindergarteners with name cards (containing only their first name) and something they can use to recreate their name, such as, play dough, sand, finger paint, pudding, white boards, chalkboard, or shaving cream.

As children experience writing their name with the different materials, discuss the letter and spelling pattern relationships that are present in each child's name.

"Well, look at that. J for Jon. /J/ for Jon. The sound /J/ is written with a J, like in Jon. Do we have anyone else in the class whose name begins with J? Yes, you are right. Jodie begins with a J."

Focusing on first letter sounds is a relatively simple task. You can challenge more advanced kindergarteners by discussing the ending and middle letters and spelling patterns in their names: "Let’s see, Jon. Your name begins with a J, but what letter and sound does it end with? You are right! An n. Jon's name ends with the letter n, which sounds like /n/.

This information was produced by the National Center for Family Literacy for use on www.thinkfinity.org, a powerful educational platform supported by the Verizon Foundation. This information is in the public domain and may be reproduced for noncommercial purposes without permission.

Copyright © 2005 by the National Center for Family Literacy. Produced by the National Center for Family Literacy (NCFL) (325 W. Main Street, Suite 300, Louisville, Kentucky 40202-4237).