Routine · Phonological awareness
Swap a sound
Change one sound in a spoken word to make a new word.
- Time
- 2 to 4 minutes
- Skill
- Phonological awareness
- In a session plan
- Warm-up
When to use it
Once a student can take sounds away, and before word chains with letters.
Materials
- A prepared list of swaps, such as map to cap, hot to hop, pin to pan
Steps
Get ready
Tell the student every new word comes from changing just one sound.
I do
Say a word, the sound to change and the new sound, then the new word.
Say: Map. Change /m/ to /k/. Cap.
We do
Do the next swap together.
Say: Hot. Change /t/ to /p/. Together.
Student: Hop.
You do
Give six swaps: first sounds, then last sounds, then middle vowels.
Student: Says each new word.
Check
Give two middle vowel swaps in a row, such as pin to pan to pun.
If the student...
Changes more than one sound.
Hold up fingers for each sound of the first word and swap only one finger as you say the new sound. Say the new word together, then redo the item alone.
Tips
- Middle vowel swaps are the hardest. Give them last and keep them to two or three.
- This is the spoken version of a word chain. Doing it first makes the letter chain go faster.
Original routines written by Literacy Trail. In the app, every routine is filled with your student's lesson.
Related routines
- Take a sound awaySay a word without one of its parts or sounds and tell what is left.2 to 4 minutes · Warm-up
- Word chain with letter tilesBuild a word with tiles, then change one letter at a time to make the next word.3 to 6 minutes · Word chain
- Clap the syllablesJoin spoken syllables into a word, then clap a word back into its syllables.2 to 4 minutes · Warm-up
- First sound plus the restJoin a first sound to the rest of a word, and split a word after its first sound.2 to 4 minutes · Warm-up
Have this routine filled in for every lesson
In Literacy Trail, the session plan picks a routine for each block and fills it with the words, sounds and sentence from your student's lesson. Every plan starts with a 15-day free trial.