Sort the Words: Which Fruit Takes A and Which Takes An

There is not a picture anywhere on this 1st grade a or an page. Eight fruits are printed as words instead, in white chips across the top of the sheet: pineapple, coconut, banana, lime, pomegranate, papaya, orange, apple. Below them stand two tall bins, one headed with a small pill reading a and the other reading an, each ruled with six dashed lines. The child reads every chip, decides which little word belongs in front of it, and copies the fruit onto a line inside the right bin. At least two of the eight go under each heading.

Every other page in this family gives the child a picture and asks them to say the name aloud, because a and an is decided by sound. Taking the pictures away changes the task into a reading one: the word has to be decoded first, and only then can its opening sound be heard. That is why this version sits in first grade rather than kindergarten. Copying the whole word into the bin rather than circling a chip is deliberate too, since writing it forces a second look at the letters. The chips a child hesitates over are the ones worth noticing, and pineapple and papaya catch more children than apple ever does.

Print the PDF free and have each chip read out loud before it is written down, since the ear is still the judge even when the picture has gone. The bins are unevenly filled by design; counting them is not a way to check the answers. A or an with four picture cards is the spoken introduction to the same rule, a or an with eight picture cards adds the pictures back at greater length, and write the word for 1st grade is where these fruit names get spelled rather than copied.