How to teach ai sound:

We are going to teach kids the ai sound through 6 steps. Each step will add a lot of fun and liveliness to the learning time. Let’s see together:

1. sound ai story:

kail is a good boy. He goes to school every day. he studies hard to get the best marks and make his mom happy. There was one problem with kail, that every holiday, he listens to all his favorite cartoons and youtube channels using the handsfree. When his mom talks to him, he keeps saying “ai, ai?”. He can’t understand what his mom says easily. kail became unable to listen clearly to others with time even without the handsfree. When his mother took him to the doctor, he told him not to wear his hands free for a long time as it is why he always say “ai, ai ” to his mom.

2. ai sound pronunciation video:

• “ai” is a vowel digraph that is considered a long “a” sound like in the words rain, pain, and main.
• To pronounce the “ai” digraph you should focus on the correct position of your lips and tongue.
• Partially open your mouth, spread your lips wide and make them tense.
• Raise the middle of your tongue to the roof of your mouth and push it to the front. The tip of your tongue should be down, just behind your bottom front teeth. 
• Remember, the “ai”  is a tense sound, so your lips and your tongue should be very tense. Your jaw should be partially lowered.

3. jolly phonics digraph ai dictation:

walk with your kid step by step on his notebook to write the following digraph. Show him the gif below and motivate him to imitate it.

4. ai sound digraph tracing worksheet:

Here’s the digraph “ai” tracing worksheet to practice:

5. jolly phonics sound ai blending exercise:

Use our phonics phase 2 flashcards to practice some pronunciation activities with your kid: 

• First level: Make combinations of the flashcards below and let the child recognize which letters are making the sound “ai”.
• Advanced level: Let the child assemble the words below by himself. keep telling him the pronunciation of the word until he can make the combination alone. 

• The word the kid should make here is “train”.

Try other words too…

6. jolly phonics sound ai – words dictation:

Write on the board or on a piece of paper the following table of graphemes. Give the kid some oral words that can only be combined with available graphemes in the table. See how your kid will be able to form a word from.

The teacher/parent here may say :

maid

Now the kid has to know how to form the latter word from the table using his listening skills and his knowledge of blending.

after the teacher/parent pronounce the word the kid should arrange the word following the pronunciation he heard

if you want more content for your kid you can check our free educational games