My youngest daughter has begun reading and knows all her letter sounds with the phonics cards, picture flash cards etc. She is doing great at sounding out words and memorizing the 'families' of sounds (like at words...cat,mat,sat,fat and an words can,man,fan, dan,etc) however she is starting to see more words with W and U and can't seem to remember the sound when she sees these in a word. Any ideas on helping her with this? These are the only 2 letters she is having a hard time with. Some W and U activities would be great. These are kind of difficult sounds to remember and not too many U words to lable around the house, etc.
Also - i must do something wrong somehow because both my 2 oldser kids have struggled with this and now I am doing it again with the youngest. She has all the sounds of the word but can't seem to "smoosh" them together to form the word. set- she has the s e & t sound but says each individually. Any ideas on how to help with this or what I am doing wrong to mess up each of my children. LOL it seems that as soon as they start reading with a teacher at school this problem disappears, however I may homeschool her for kindergarten sooooooo that won't help her. Thanks for all your help- you smart mamas!
If she's not even in Kindergarten yet, she's WAY ahead of her developmental milestones. There's no need to worry about it. She'll get it eventually. She can already do MILES more than lots of kids her age. My daughter is the same way and she's 3. I was told by her ped and by a preschool teacher that she'll get it eventually.Just keep working with her. I don't think you're doing anything wrong at all!
Get her an umbrella, and let her play and say,umbrella,underwear, water in the bath. There are special sayings that you can teach her to repeat but I'm afraid I don't know where to find them but here is an example, The yellow pillow. This is how you help kids with the letter L which my son pronounced as a W. Maybe you can make something up using this structure. Also listen to how your saying the letter yourself. My brother in law used to say oyyal for oil. So try away awash always...
It sounds like you are doing just fine, and WAY more than lots of other parents...... I bet teachers wish all the parents of their students were like you!
Get out the scrabble pieces and mess around with those, do the word families with u sounds (stun, sun, bun, etc; truck, stuck, muck--yeah, you gotta watch that one!)
The collages someone else mentioned sound like a good idea too.
She will get it, don't worry! have fun (hey, there's a u word!) and enjoy your kiddos!
K. Z.
The letter "U" faces UP, like the word 'UP", the sound "U"....umbrella, under, unkind, etc. If she sees it and remembers that it points UPWARD, like in the word UP, she should be able to remember the sound along with it. I help people with this kind of thing all the time.
"W"...woah, wood, winter, wash (a good one because the letter goes up and down like when you wash your hands). Find ONE word that she recognizes it and then will relate that letter to the word and remember the sound.
Your daughter WILL GET it eventually. You're doing everything right. My son had the same problem with the letter U for what seemed like forever! I tried everything creative and fun. Interesting too because he has a letter U in his name and was able to master the letters sounds of his whole name by age 3, except for the letter U! Someone recommended the LeapFrog Letter Factory video to me. Within 2 days he got it just from watching the video a few times. Go figure! Now he's 4 1/2 and has been reading real well for the past 6-7 months without any problems.
Take a large sheet of paper and print Capital and lower case "U" on it .
Then go through magazines or catalogues and help her find pictures and words with the letter "U".(You could go through them first and tear out pages that have such words/pictures on them if you have time.)
Have her cut them out and paste onto the sheet you have prepared.
Do the same for the letter "W" and/or any other letter you want.
Have her say and repeat the words you find, and the "U" or "W" sound in each.
Hang the sheets on the wall where she can see them.
In addition, make your own "flash cards" with "U" or "W" words/pictures on them with index cards.
Have fun with it.
If you talk to a speech therapist they will tell you that different sounds are worked out at different ages. You are putting too much blame on your self. I have had my son work a speech therapist since the age of 3 and he is about to turn 12. I have always known that he would have some speech issues but that some sounds come later. Mom don't worry about it and enjoy your kids.
go on a w treasure hunt? look all over the house or store for w things. maybe get some word ideas from the dictionary.
just read with her a lot and have her point to the words and/or repeat them after you read them. don't make it too academic, just fun!
Not sure about the W, but with the U sound I would punch myself in the stomach, and say "uuuuh" real loud. It's pretty catchy, and they usually think it's funny. As far as blending the letters together, and having them flow, that just takes time. Just keep doing what you're doing, and you'll be surprised when one day all of a sudden she gets it. Lots of practice! Good luck!
I don't think it is what you are doing. Probably just the age, but here is a suggestion.
Draw a face in the U. A face you can mimick and point at your daughter and kiddlingly say "youuuuuu." This can become a game. Hold up a card with the U (and face) and say "youuuuuu" whenever funny or appropriate. Repetition should do the trick. You can do something else for the W if you need to, like draw a bunch of W's looking like "water." w, w, w, water.
Just a thought. Good Luck, and remember not to worry because she WILL eventually get it.
