Play on Words

Bag or big? One letter changes and it’s a new word.

The cat saw the bat in the bag…
Play with words, changing only one letter at a time.

Goals

To develop vocabulary.
To play with the creation of words.

The adult prepares

1 alphabet baseplate

The children play

Player 1 finds a three-letter word and writes it on the baseplate.

Player 2 must change just one letter to make a new word, either by replacing a letter or adding a new one.

Players take turns until no more words can be created.

It’s a three-letter word,
So find the first letter.
It’s a ‘p’.
-Lovely,
What’s the sound?
-’P’.
Good boy. So that’s the ‘p’.
What’s the ..?
‘a’.
Okay, so what’s the sound?
-’A’.
And then what’s the third?
-’T’.
Lovely. So what’s our sound?
-’T’!
So what’s our word, so remember?
-’Pat’.
Well done. Good boy.
So, I’m going to give you the alphabet board
now and we’re going to change.
Can I have your hands a moment?
We’re going to change the first letter
to make a new word with the other sounds.
‘A’, ‘T’.
-’A’, ‘T’.
Okay, so take away the ‘P’.
Thank you.
I’ll take that.
And I’m going to place it
on the back on the base plate.
So now we’re going to find a new word.
Can you make me a new word
with a ‘A’, ‘T’?
-We can put a ‘B’.
Okay. What would the B make?
-’Bat’.
So place it.
There we go.
Okay, so now, we’re going to
try and spell another word.