What are CVC Words?

Home » Montessori at Home » CVC Worksheets & Activities » What are CVC Words?

We’ve been introducing one phoneme (letter sound) at a time with out “sss is for sounds” series, and this week I wanted to take a break from learning letter sounds to explore the concept of CVC words.

CVC words are integral to any pre-reading program and they have a special importance in the Montessori Method, as they are the first step from knowing the letter sounds to sounding out simple words. The first stage of reading, the pink series, is composed of only CVC words and can be started as soon as children have a firm letter sound (phonemic) awareness.

What are CVC words and how can you use them to teach your child to read? If your child even knows 7 letter sounds, they can start learning how to read! Grab our free printable and tips

CVC words are mostly consonant-vowel-consonant words, such as pig or run, that are easy to sound out and contain a short vowel sound; there are also VC words such as “it,” “is,” “ax,” etc.

I generally teach VC words alongside CVC words when presenting the Montessori pink series.

“CCVC” (consonant-consonant-vowel-consonant) and “CVCC” (consonant-vowel-consonant-consonant) words are often included in CVC sheets and activities, and are very similar to CVC words except they begin or end with simple letter blends, like flap or bend.

In the Montessori Method, CCVC words are taught in the “blue series” following the pink series. This is because we want to avoid overwhelming children with having them learn two concepts at once: decoding CVC words and learning letter blends.

CVC words are incredibly rewarding for children to work on, as they allow them to experience and understand the transformation of simple sounds into words.

CVC words are the first step to unlocking the mysteries and wonders of the English language, and while many teachers and parents wait until children have a firm grasp of all letter sounds and blends, I introduce simple CVC words early so that children can understand why we’re learning all of these letter sounds, and to act as an intrinsic motivation to continue working on our phonemic awareness. (When they see the reward of a “hard task” it is more encouraging to keep learning.)

I ensure that the children had a firm grasp of two vowels and three consonants, to give us a variety of CVC words to work with. For example, with an understanding of s, a, t, i, and m, we can spell: sat, sit, mat, mitt, miss, Sam, Tim, Matt.

You can prepare a variety of materials to work with in exploring simple CVC words, but just one activity — or a set of Bob books— would be perfect. The key is to offer something hands-on that your child will be attracted to working with that will also provide some control of error.

An interesting element of CVC words is that they are easily memorized and are thus most effortlessly converted to long-term memory, so children can learn (and remember) the physical representation of the word and the sound at the same time, resulting in deep semantic coding; that physical representation can also be two-fold: the written word, as well as a picture or object representing that word.

In the Montessori Pink Series, we combine written flash cards of the CVC words with small objects representing those words. For example, an index card with “dog” written on it can be paired with a small dog figurine.

Here are 10 fun activities we used to learn some simple CVC words, and below I share a free printable list of CVC words. I also have some separate CVC printables listed at the bottom of this post and I’ve linked to my DIY Montessori Pink Series.

Grab your Free Complete List of CVC Words Printable

For more CVC printables, check out:

A fun way to work with CVC words is the Montessori pink series, which I explain in more detail here and give you a free printable to make your own here.

To keep in the loop with my educational posts and free printables, make sure to subscribe to my e-mail updates.

Be sure to pin this post to help you with your learning to read planning!

CVC words printable at Sugar, Spice and Glitter  What are CVC words and how can you use them to teach your child to read? If your child even knows 7 letter sounds, they can start learning how to read! Grab our free printable and tips

Similar Posts

14 Comments

    1. I was surprised when I didn’t find many out there — and the ones that I found were incomplete or had a couple that weren’t actually CVC words. Let me know if there are ever other things you can’t seem to find; maybe it’ll inspire me to make a relevant printable!

  1. Thanks for the post! My LO had learned 8 sandpaper letters and showed great interest in the movable alphabet. So I followed his interest and like you said, it worked. He was able to spell many words with just 2 short vowel sounds and 6 consonants. The pride in being able to write without help has really elevated his interest in learning more letter sounds. This list will be incredibly helpful!

  2. I can not download the short vowel cvc list the link just takes me round in circles on your page. Is there another link I am missing please. Cheers

  3. Are fed up with the same old thing and are at present more excited than the children thank you for adding us,

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.