Pink Material Picture/Word Match

Once a student has learned all of the letter sounds I start to have them blend the sounds to form words.  I set out the letters s, a, and t from the moveable alphabet and then say the sounds /s/-/a/-/t/ while pointing to each letter.  I say it again a little faster and then again even faster.  Then I say the word.  I put out three new letters and have the student try.  When they have begun to blend letter sounds to make words I show them this work.  I put the word cards on the left side of the rug and the large card with the pictures on the right side of the rug.  I name the pictures.  I then say the sounds of the letters on the first card.  I then say the picture name.  If it doesn't sound the same, I move on to the next picture name and repeat the letter sounds and the picture name.  Example: first card says net; I say /n/-/e/-/t/ mat and shake my head no.  Then I say /n/-/e/-/t/ bed and shake my head no.  /n/-/e/-/t/ net and shake my head yes and place the word card under the picture.  I do one more and then have the student try.

 This photo shows my storage system for the pink material picture/word match cards.  I taped an envelope to the back of the card.  Then I mark the envelope and each card with a colored dot.  This card is red so the envelope has a red dot and all the word cards that go with that group have red dots.

The cards that I have in my classroom are from our North American Montessori Center teacher training manual but you can find printables like this at the following websites or you could easily make your own:

Montessori Print Shop

Homemade Montessori

Montessori Materials