Nonsense Words Flashcards & Worksheets – Decoding

Students sound out CVC nonsense words, distinguish them from real words and sort examples. Flashcards, reading lists and cut-and-glue activities offer several ways to practise decoding.
Grades
Grades 1–3, Elementary
Pages
89
File type
PDF
Preparation
Print ready

Updated Feb 10, 2023

Subject
ELA, Phonics, Language Development
Topic
Nonsense words, Phonics decoding
Resource types
Flashcards, Worksheets & Printables, Worksheets
Preparation
Print ready
Standards
RF.1.3.b

Product description

From the author

This set of nonsense word activities and flashcards will help your students practice decoding words, sounding out words, paying attention to whether the word is real or nonsense, sorting words, and being better at breaking apart larger words because they can identify smaller parts. Have fun with this! Nonsense words are one of the most fun parts of learning to read! I hope this resource helps you to create an enjoyable and effective phonics curriculum!

How To Use This:

Look through all the phonics resources provided in this kit and decide which ones will best work with your curriculum approach and teaching style. Print out what you need, laminate the things you want to reuse or save for the next year. Some of the worksheets have them sounding out just nonsense words. The other sets mix nonsense words with real words. Print enough worksheets and activity pages for all your students. Then have fun implementing your phonics lessons!

Several formats and options are provided so you won't run out of worksheets! Don't undervalue the power of nonsense words! They are a fun and effective way to help children slow down and really study each word until their brain can do it more fluently.

What You Get:

  • - Teacher list of nonsense words

  • - 354 CVC practice flashcards

  • - 30 half-sheet study lists for thirty weekly sessions

  • - 30 "Find the Real Words" worksheets

  • One sorting mat and nineteen half-sheet word-card sets on ten pages

In the classroom

Teaching tips & learning objectives

Learning objectives

  • Decode unfamiliar CVC letter strings by pure sound-blending rather than sight memory

  • Distinguish real English words from pronounceable nonsense words

  • Build decoding fluency through daily list review and one-minute timed reads

Teaching tips

  • Use the teacher list as the master reference — the how-to page notes the 354 words are a sample, not an exhaustive set

  • Mix the flashcards into a pile of real-word cards and ask students to sound out each unfamiliar string

  • For the sorting activity, let early finishers just pile cards on the correct column instead of gluing — the directions offer both

Skills covered

  • Phonics decoding — students blend consonant-vowel-consonant strings such as bab, kex, and wug to practise sounding out unfamiliar strings.

  • Real-word discrimination — Find The Real Words sheets require circling genuine words and crossing out decodable fakes.

  • Word sorting — tiny cards mixing real words (sun, bat, dog) with nonsense words are cut out and sorted onto a two-column mat.

Good to know

Questions teachers ask about this resource

How do the practice formats build on each other?

Flashcards introduce pure sound-out practice, the weekly study lists add daily review and one-minute timed reads, the Find The Real Words sheets add judgment (circle real, X nonsense), and the cut-and-glue sort makes that judgment hands-on with mixed word cards on a two-column mat.

Are real words mixed in anywhere?

Yes — the sorting card pages deliberately shuffle real words such as sun, bat, dog, and hat among the nonsense words so students must decode and classify each one; the how-to page also suggests mixing the flashcards into a set of regular word cards.

How long can the set stretch across a year?

The 30 study lists are described as one per week for the school year, and the 30 matching Find The Real Words sheets can run on the same weekly rhythm, with flashcards and sorting as ongoing centers.

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Curriculum

Standards, concepts & topics

Standards

  • RF.1.3.b

Core concepts

  • CVC words

  • Nonsense-word decoding

  • Phonemic blending

  • Reading fluency

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