Let’s Play With Sounds | A Gentle First Phonics Book for Toddlers

Let’s Play With Sounds | A Gentle First Phonics Book for Toddlers

Learn the sound, not the letter.

Let’s Play With Sounds is a playful first introduction to phonics for toddlers and young children, created to build the listening, imitation and mouth movement skills that come before formal phonics teaching.

This isn’t a book about sitting toddlers down to learn letter names, trace letters or memorise the alphabet. In fact, children don’t need to learn to read yet at all. Instead, each page invites them to hear a sound, copy it, notice how their mouth moves and have fun making it together.

The sounds are connected to familiar, playful experiences children can understand. Hiss like a snake for ‘ssssss’, blow like the wind for ‘fffff’, make a yummy ‘mmmmm’, buzz like a bee, pop bubbles, beat a drum, chug like a train or hoot like an owl. Each sound is paired with a simple rhyme and an interactive action, turning those very first phonics experiences into something physical, memorable and fun.

There’s support for grown ups too. Throughout the book, simple prompts show you how to form the sound correctly, including where to place the lips or tongue and when to use the voice or airflow. There’s also an important reminder not to add an unnecessary “uh” onto sounds, so children hear ‘ssss’ rather than ‘suh’ and ‘ffff’ rather than ‘fuh’.

Across 44 colourful pages, children can explore a collection of early sounds through animals, movement, everyday objects, silly noises and repetition, before revisiting them together on the Sound Recap page.

44 page digital bookPerfect for: Toddlers and young children beginning to notice and imitate soundsSupports: Listening and attention, speech sound awareness, communication and language, oral motor awareness, imitation and early foundations for later phonicsIdeal for: Childminders, nurseries, preschools and families

Use a page at circle time, leave it in your book area, revisit a favourite sound or follow the children and see which noises make them laugh enough to ask for them again.

No flashcards. No testing. No pressure to learn letters. Just listen, copy, move and play with sounds.