Teaching Final Consonant Blends

Are you working on ending blends in your classroom? When it comes to first grade, you're likely spending a fair bit of time teaching students on how to blend letter sounds together. This essential skill will promote fluency in your young readers but can sometimes be a tad intimidating to students. If you've had kiddos struggle with learning to blend sounds together, this post is for you! Today I'm chatting about how to target final consonant blends in a fun way in the primary classroom! 

Making Final Consonant Blends Fun 

Teaching first grade is my very favorite because there are so many opportunities to make learning fun. After all, first graders are a cheery bunch and eager to participate in learning games and activities! When educators work hard to make lessons fit the needs of the child, rather than the other way around, we can expect to see great progress and excitement in our classrooms. For this reason, it's always been important to me to make sure that my phonics lessons are fun and engaging. This is especially important when it comes to trickier topics like ending consonant blends. 

Over the years, I have observed that many children struggle to blend letters together. Some get it right off the bat, while others need plenty of examples and activities to help them grasp this concept. As with anything else in first grade, this means lots of practice! To keep this topic light and fun for my students, I like to incorporate music into my teaching. 

Popping a fun video like this one for Ending Consonant Blends for N is the perfect introduction to a variety of centers and small group activities for this topic. The fun, upbeat music in the video will encourage students to perk up while we dive into practicing final consonant blends. Typically, I'll play a video like this to start our lessons off and encourage my students to sing along as they get the hang of the blends. Introducing the concept with a fun video prior to small groups is a fantastic start that will help make this skill less intimidating to firsties!

Small Group Activities for Ending Blends

When it comes to working on final consonant blends, I love seeing the magic that happens in my small groups. Working with students in small groups is a great opportunity to assess where kiddos are at and offer more direct support to those that need it. My goal when it comes to teaching letter blends is to make students feel confident and capable in their skillset. After seeing countless kiddos struggle with this skill, I've found that a bit of confidence and perseverance can help tremendously. 

Once we're in small groups, I like to focus on fun activities like word-sorting games to get some practice in with these sounds. In my small group, I want to structure this activity in a way that children will take turns choosing a card, sounding out the word, and then sorting it into the correct ending blend category. 

Using a fun, interactive sorting game like this one will present opportunities for students to observe their peers, listen for specific ending sounds and try to identify the sounds themselves. I love opening with a game like this because it continues to reinforce that this skill is FUN, which helps boost confidence in my kiddos and gives them the practice they need. 

Center Activities for Final Consonant Blends

Once kiddos have had a chance to work with me on this skill in a small group setting, I like to encourage some continued teamwork with centers and partner games. One of my favorite activities for this is "Four in a Row". For this game, kiddos will use a paperclip spinner to select an ending blend. They say the blend aloud, then find a matching picture on their game board. Working in pairs is a great way for students to continue to hear these sounds from peers and support each other in learning this skill. Plus, it doesn't take much coaxing to get the kiddos to split up into pairs for game time! 

Another excellent option for getting additional practice in with ending blends is clip cards and recording sheets. I love prepping these ahead of time and using them as an independent center station while we target final consonant blends. Typically, I'll have kiddos work on identifying the correct word for the picture on each card. Then, they'll use the coordinating worksheets to write the words into the boxes. These worksheets are a great way to quickly assess student understanding of these blends. I use this activity at the beginning of our studies on this topic and once again at the end to compare how my students have improved. 

Finally, I always make sure to include a student favorite in these practice activities- write the room! My kids LOVE moving around the classroom with clipboards and searching for each card. You can also use these cards for a "Scoot" style game by laying them out on student desks and having kids move from one to the next. Either way, these cards are a great way to get some wiggles out and continue identifying final consonant blends in a fun way. 

Even More Practice with Final Consonant Blends

Finally, I like to round out these learning activities with a variety of no-prep printable worksheets. Using these after children have had plenty of opportunities to practice these skills in centers and small groups is the perfect way to follow up and check in on student comprehension. These worksheets are a great way to practice and review as independent desk work, morning work, homework, or as an informal assessment. 

All of the activities in the worksheets utilize easily decodable words and sentences to help promote independence among my students. We work on sorting words by ending blends, identifying specific blends in sentences, matching the correct word, and more. 

Finish Up with a Whole Group Game

When the week is coming to a close and we've been hard at work on final consonant blends for a few days, I like to finish out our lessons with a fun, whole group game like BINGO. If you teach in the primary classroom, I'm sure BINGO is one of your favorite games as well since it's easy to use, quick to prep, and fun for students. Using a final blends BINGO game will continue to show students how much fun phonics can be and is great once they have had some practice with these blends prior. 

BINGO will help your students read words with final consonant blends more quickly and build excitement around fluency with these sounds. I like to keep this game handy for any time we have a few minutes to spare in the afternoon. Using this game after the lessons are over is a great way to pop a quick review of these skills in while offering engaging practice. 

Start Teaching Final Consonant Blends in Your Classroom

Adding some variety to your lessons and keeping the activities fun and light is my best tip for helping students who struggle with blends. We've all seen how frustrated kiddos get who struggle to blend letters together, so offering games, songs, partner activities, and fun printables are great ways to remind students that learning should be fun. There are so many fun activities out there but if you'd like to check out any of the ones mentioned in this post, be sure to hop on over to my store. You'll find a variety of activities to fit any classroom's needs! 

Save This Post 

Pin this post on your classroom Pinterest board to keep all of these activities for teaching final consonant blends handy!