Short Vowel Sounds for Kids

Hello friends,

As most of you know by now I am a great fan of the synthetic phonics system of Jolly Phonics. When my elder son was 3 years old, he was introduced to Jolly Phonics. It was a completely new thing for me as I belong to the generation that learned to read by memorizing that A is for apple and B is for B. We were never taught the sounds of the alphabet. We learned their names. I guess our brains just added the missing link of sounds on their own. A huge thanks to the people behind the Jolly Phonics and other synthetic phonics systems. Instead of second-guessing the sounds of the alphabet on their own, children now learn the sounds first and then, the names of the alphabet.

I got inspiration from my son’s education to develop my first mobile app. Check out my free Jolly Phonics Mobile App. It is an all-in-one solution to everything related to phonics. The complete version is 100% FREE.

Phonics has become the starting point of learning to read in almost all countries of the world. Children learn the sounds of the letters and can recognize that the letter ‘a’ makes the sound /a/ – the beginning sound that our mouth makes when we say the word apple.

The Jolly Phonics system of synthetic phonics divides the English alphabet into groups in order of difficulty. For example, group 1 has the letters s, a, t, i, p, and n. These letters are not just easy to learn but they also make the most 3-lettered words so that children can start to blend sounds and read 3-lettered words as soon as they know the group 1 sounds.

However, any kind of learning requires patience. I recommend that children spend at least a week on one letter before moving on to another letter. Moreover, make learning phonics fun by using my Jolly Phonics Fun app. Children can not only learn phonics sounds but also test their learning using multiple matching activities.

You can download my app from the Google Play Store. It is 100% FREE.

When the children have done the first 3 groups of Jolly Phonics, they are done with all the vowels (a, e, i, o, and u). They have learned the short sounds of these vowels. Short sounds of the vowels are the sounds that are different from the sounds that our mouth makes when we say the names of the vowels. For example, /u/ is the sound made by the vowel “u” when we say the word “umbrella”.⛱

The long sounds of vowels are the sounds that are the same as the name of the vowels. For example, the long sound of a is the beginning sound that our mouth makes when we say the word “ate”, which is exactly the same as the name of the alphabet “A”.

So, I decided to make these short vowel sounds worksheets so that children can practice their blending. I recommend using these worksheets once the child has done the first 3 groups of Jolly Phonics.

Using these worksheets is very simple:

1. Download the high-quality PDF

2. Print the worksheets on A4 size paper

3. Give a crayon 🖍 to your kids

Download PDF

I have designed coloring, matching, and writing activities in these worksheets for all five vowels. I hope you like this effort. Do let me know in the comments if you like this kind of material so that I can think of something more interesting for future projects.

Links to more Jolly Phonics resources:

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How to make your children early readers of English – A mother’s perspective

Jolly Phonics FREE mobile app

Jolly Phonics Group 1 Worksheets

Jolly Phonics Group 2 Worksheets

Jolly Phonics Group 3,4 and 5 Worksheets

Jolly Phonics Group 6 & 7 Worksheets

Jolly Phonics Short Vowel Worksheets

Jolly Phonics Flash Cards

Jolly Phonics Fun Activities

CVC Cut and Paste Activities