Reception phonics games

Ages 4–5

Teaches 31 phonics sounds, grouped into basic words.

Play Reception words

Opens Tick or Fix.

Your child learns individual letter sounds first, not alphabetically, building fast into simple words like "sat", "pin" and "dog". Two-letter sounds join in from partway through the year — "th", "ch", "sh" and "qu". A small set of "tricky words" that don't follow the rules gets taught too — "the", "said", "you". This is standard Reception phonics teaching in England.

Checked against the National Curriculum in England, published by the Department for Education.

Games that match Reception

• Fredle — phonics word puzzle.
• Tick or Fix — fix the word, win a star.
• ABC Gap — find the missing letter.
• b or d — which way round? b d p q.
• Number Words — spell the number, win a star.
• Make a Rainbow — drop the colours in order.

Opening a game from this page sets the school year to Reception, and every game then keeps the words at that level — so a Reception child gets Reception words, not a guess. The school year is a tap away inside the game, so a child moving up a year, or a younger sibling taking a turn, changes it in seconds.

No US grade covers these ages: the US starts with Kindergarten, ages 5–6. See US grades.