Spell With Sounds

Spell With Sounds means spelling words using the sounds of letters instead of the names, like we do in spelling bees and which we here teach the kids to call Spell With Names. It’s the simplest phonics program you can find. Instead of syllable types and consonants and vowels, every word is a word you can sound out or a word with letters you memorize.

Our nonprofit program is the perfect bridge between learning the alphabet and reading books independently. It's free for teachers and families of kids who are just learning letters to those who already can read 200+ words (Pre-k to 3rd grade remediation). Teachers will have up to 6 students using devices at once, tracing letters for sounds and spelling out words with the most effective literacy strategies, and the program will help parents know what to do for their kids, with everything from pronunciation guides for their first words (decodable or not) to complete-the-sentence activities.

Click For Free Worksheets

We have research-based animations and more than 1,000 printable worksheets for a list of 500 words in which the words are structured in comprehensible sentences to review recently learned words and make them their words. The program's excellent for making neat writers, beginning with the simplest tracing, but was made to help struggling readers in particular.

This page provides a general introduction to our site and what you'll find on it. If you'd like, click over to the page on our materials to find out more about what you'll be using to teach your kids or to the research page or student needs page to learn why our materials help and the needs they help with.

Click to see
our complete
word list.

We have 2 worksheets (levels 1 & 2) for each of the 500 words and spelling practice sheets for the words that can be visualized. We also have animations for each word that can be sounded out. These animations, our letter-sound correspondence page, and the rapid letter reading page help even the children who struggle most with their letters.

Learning Simply

Our original animations are not like cartoons, but are research-based to keep your child's attention AND get them sounding out words the correct way. It's not just listening and clicking on the screen, as happens with some games. Children have to be turning letters and words into sounds to really learn how to read. Passive listening will not do. Below we discuss our worksheets and the word list, but if you'd like to start learning more about our animations, click over to the materials page.

Like our animations, the worksheets, too, are distinct. Our spelling practice pages will have the kids using spelling strategies 2x for each word-pictogram pair. On the word pages, each word is written at least 10 times. The sentences were made using only the words in our programs, and the word to learn is almost never more complex than any helping word, even with the simplest words. Imagine learning to read the word 'it' in sentences with the word 'swims' or 'flies'!

Instead, the students use known words to decide if the new word makes sense. Asking the students why the word makes sense or doesn't and talking about it will be great for growth as a reader and writer. All 4 language domains are developed with our program! The kids are going to know these words really well.

In addition to high frequency words and regularly sounded out words, we've included a lot of words for things the kids will know and be able to more easily think about (lots of animals, actions, and objects) so that they will be able to more easily write their own thoughts with the words they learn. To say it simply: it's easier to write (and think) about a cat than a yak, though both words have 3 letters.