6 Syllable Activities to Develop Readers

**Read to gain 6 fun syllable activities to try in your classroom or at home that are low prep!

My daughter came to me the other day and asked me to help her figure out a word in the book she was reading. She told me she knew the middle part of the word but could not figure out the first part. The word was “preheated”. I told her the word had three syllables. Since she knew the middle part was heat, we started working on the first syllable. She knew the first syllable was pre and determined it was an open syllable and the vowel was going to say its long sound. Knowing how many syllables were in the word and the syllable types helped her decode that first syllable so she could read the whole word.

Do your students know how to break words into syllables? Let’s chat about the importance of being able to break words into syllables and some syllable activities you can do in your classroom to help your readers with this! 

Why is it Important to Break Words into Syllables? 

Being able to break words into syllables is imperative for accurate decoding of single syllable and multisyllabic words. It also helps with reading fluency and aids students in correct spelling. When words are broken into syllables, readers have more manageable, smaller chunks. This allows readers to look for syllable types and accurately decode.  

6 Syllable Activities to Try With Your Class

There are so many ways to practice breaking words into syllables with your class. You can make it fun and engaging by incorporating movement and by playing interactive games together. Here are some syllable activities you can use in your classroom! 

1. Syllable Jump

Call out a word or hold up an item. Have your students jump or stomp for each syllable in the word. This activity is great for getting out the wiggles and working on syllables at the same time!

2. Syllable Ladder

This activity would probably work best as a center or with a smaller group of students! Use painter’s tape or chalk to make a numbered ladder on the floor. Say a word or hold up a classroom item. Children will jump into the number box that matches the number of syllables they heard in the word. This activity could also work with a giant hopscotch drawn on the concrete outside. Again, we are incorporating movement into their learning!

3. Syllable Clip Cards

I love clip cards! They are a great way for your students to practice a specific skill as well as get some fine motor practice with clothespins. Students will read the word and then use a clothespin to clip the number of syllables they heard in the word. I have a set of syllable clip cards ready for you HERE.

4. Counting Syllables Matching

This activity can be used in a station or small group! Students will read the picture cards and identify the number of syllables in the word. They will group the pictures together by the number of syllables they hear. You can grab this matching game HERE. 

5. Syllable Sorting

This activity incorporates movement and is interactive. This could easily be a literacy center, too. Students will sort picture cards or classroom objects into numbered baskets. You could also have students find objects and determine the number of syllables in them. This is great to add to your collection of syllable activities!

6. Syllable Tic-Tac-Toe

Create a blank grid for each student. You could number the grid with the numbers 1-4 or have your students number their grid. Call out words and have students cover the correct number of syllables for that word on their tic-tac-toe card.

If you feel like your readers are struggling with decoding, you could try pausing, and circling back to work on syllable activities. When they know where and how to divide words correctly, this will unlock a superpower with decoding.  

Do you have any favorite syllable activities you use to teach students how to identify and determine the number of syllables in a word or picture? I’d love to hear some of your favorites below!