Digraph Sort for Kindergarten: sh or ch

Three tall columns fill this kindergarten page. The left column is headed sh, the right column ch, and down the middle runs a line of six pictures with a dot on each side. The child says each picture's name and draws a line from the picture to the letter team they hear. The sheet shown runs a bar of chocolate, a pair of shorts, a wheelchair, a wedge of cheese, a shoe and a shrimp, three for each team, with the sound at the start of the word or of its last part.

Two teams, not three, is what makes this a kindergarten page. The child only has to decide between the soft sh and the sharper ch, which is the pair young children confuse most, and every picture is a word they use every day. There is no writing and no reading; the letters are there to look at while the ears do the work. Kindergarten is readiness for digraphs rather than the year they are formally taught, so treat the page as a listening game with the letters in sight.

One sheet, six pictures, six lines. Let children say sh with a finger to their lips and ch like a train before starting. The wheelchair has ch at the start of its second part, chair, so say both parts slowly. When the pair feels easy, the first grade base page adds th as a third choice, and the missing digraphs face asks children to write the teams themselves. Keep the finished sheet as a sound wall for the week.