What is a word Family? Word families are simply words that have some of the same combinations of letter combinations in them. When you sound them out, you will often hear similar-but as always with the English language, there are exceptions. Word families get kids to look for words that have the same letter combinations, so that they build up mental pictures of the words in their mind and also learn the sound that certain letter combinations make. Once kids are on a roll with word families, the list can seen endless. What can I do? Card games: Have a set of cards that contains the beginnings and ends of words and a set of cards that has middle letter combination on them. Put them in three separate piles. Kids take turns taking cards from the piles and trying to combine them to make words. fr ee ze fl oa t sn ee ze m oa n m ee t f oa m sl ee t b oa t All in the word Family Have a word a week on the fridge and have a reward for the person who comes up with the most words in that family. Try and break the record each week. 2 minute word families For older kids, pick word with a common letter cluster and they have to come up with as many words from the same family as the can in two minutes, 1 point for each word if they to be competitive. Dictionary Word Families How many words from the dictionary can they find that are in the same word family as the word you have chosen. It doesn't matter if they can't pronounce it right away you can have fun doing that later. Some common word families to get you started: oa ee ck ch sh rr ex fr oo lng al dd ll ss ide er ou nn st ow Reminder, the letter combination doesn't always have to be in the middle of the word, if can be at the beginning or end too. Submitted by Brett White