Teaching Letter P and the /p/ Sound
We will teach the letter P and its sound here. To make the /p/ sound, your start with your mouth closed and lips touching, and your teeth apart. As your mouth open, a puff of air is pushed through to make the /p/ sound.
Note: the name of letter P is "PEE", but it's sound is /p/, and you may see it written sometimes as "PUH".
However, it's important to note here that P makes a voiceless sound, that is, there is no vibration made in the vocal cords. So if you ended up saying the /p/ sound as "PUH", you will make an incorrect sound that becomes voiced by making the "-UH" sound.
Notice in the video when she first sounded "P" as "puh", I corrected her right away to say /p/ and not "puh".
Letter P and B make 2 different sounds, but the mouth position of the two sounds are the same. The only difference here is that letter P is unvoiced while letter B /b/ sound is voiced. Try making the /p/ and /b/ sounds. You'll notice that no sound comes from your vocal cords with the /p/ sound, while a sound is made from the vocal cords for the /b/ sound.
Try these example words for B and P:
BAD - /b/ /a/ /d/
PAD - /p/ /a/ /d/
POP - /p/ /o/ /p/
Learning Activity for /p/
- Prepare a printout for letter P
- Also print the following words:
- PAN
- POP
- LAP
- MAP
- PAPA
- SNAP
- Show the letter P to your child and demonstrate how to make the proper unvoiced /p/ sound. Do not teach it as "PUH".
- Let your child practice the /p/ sound several times.
- Work on the letter P words listed above.
- Note that letter P is a short sound that cannot be stretched. If you try to stretch it, you'll only end up distorting its sound.
- Using the word list above, ask your child to find all the /p/ sounds in each of the words.
- Work on the printable letter P worksheet provided below along with the rhyme.
Letter P Worksheets
Letter P Rhyme and Song
Grandpa cooks dinner.
Look, a spot on the pot!
Quick, wipe that spot off that pot.
Grandpa gives me some pop.
P-P-P-Pop, goes the pop can.
Oops, I spill the pop.
Quick, get the mop;
Get the mop and mop up that pop.
I mop up the pop.
Now there's no more pop.
Grandpa, can I have some more p-p-p-pop?
