A quick post tonight with an fun idea for a game we’ve been playing today all about rhymes.

Understanding the different parts of our language is important for children as they develop their own speaking, listening, reading and writing skills, and one of the parts of language is of course rhyme. It’s not necessarily something which young children understand easily. Pre-schoolers often think words which start with the same sound (walk and whistle) rhyme, instead of understanding that it’s the final sound of the word which they need to listen out for (as in walk and talk).

Little is switching on to rhymes now and will sometimes stop after she’s said something and say ‘hey, that rhymes!’. We’ve also been having fun thinking of rhyme chains, starting with a word and linking lots of rhymes. (bing, ping, wing, ling, sing, jing, ding…)

Building on this, and to have some more fun, we’ve been playing a game inventing couplets along the lines of…

I don’t like Mr. Melly, he’s too smelly.

I don’t like Mrs. Porty, she’s really naughty.

At first we had to think of the describing work first (smelly) and then have Little invent the rhyming name to go with it, as she found it too hard the other way round, where she had to think of the correct, specific adjective that could match.

Of course, using ‘rude’ words really appeals to a three year old.

We don’t like Mr. Blinky, he’s too stinky.

And as for Mrs. Fooey…….!