Phonics Apps for Little Ones (Part 1)

Rebecca from Thirteen Red Shoes is with us today to share another one of her thoughtful lists of app recommendations.

My eldest son is beginning to learn how to read and therefore needs a lot of positive experiences to build up his confidence in this area.  Below are a few apps which focus not only the sounds of letters, but also on some common sight words.

1. Mr Thorne Does Phonics | This is a hilarious series of applications and the littles are sure to adore the amazing Mr. Thorne.  This app was created by a teacher named Mr. Thorne who has filmed little videos of himself sounding and blending words.  The littles seem to enjoy this and it would be a great tool to use when reinforcing a new sound and its visual representation.
2. Pocket Phonics | We have this app on both our phone and  iPad. It is perfect for children who are learning letter formation and sounds.  A very basic, yet effective, teaching tool.
3. Phonics Play | This is a website that you can join, which offers a series of phases for kids to progress through. There is a teachers and parents section with a lot of resources as well as detailed information about the phonics process.  There is a free trial that you can try before purchasing.
4. Eggy Alphabet | This app from Reading Eggs is amazing! I really do believe that they have done this concept well, with a lot of repetition and a lot of positive feedback along the way.  Reading Eggs have a lot of different apps, depending on stages of development (I will share a few more in Part 2).  These apps are perfect for learning new sounds, which is where Little R is at presently.  There is a lot of repetition, which is perfect for consolidation of new and unfamiliar words.
5. Peapod Labs | I adore these applications (I mentioned them in my post about Literacy applications). Although they are not specifically phonics based, they do focus on the letters of the alphabet and share a number of different objects, man made and natural, that begin with the letter and the sound that it makes.  We have a few of these abc versions but the two we recently downloaded were music and farm. There are lots of interaction, fun facts and videos, as well as the option of Spanish or English as your default setting.
6. Twinkl | A website full of printables in areas including mathematics and literacy.  We have not used this site yet as we are not really into printables, but they have a few apps, which I am interested in downloading, they look fantastic! Have you tried them?

Be sure to visit my previous post about Literacy Applications and look out for Part 2 as I search for more phonics based apps over the coming weeks.