A Reading Board Game Siblings Can Play Together (Even at Different Reading Levels)

The problem: one game, two very different readers

If you have more than one kid, you know this scene. You pull out a reading game. Your second grader races through it and gets bored. Your kindergartner can't read the cards yet, gets frustrated, and quits. Or the older one starts answering for the younger one "to help," and now nobody is actually reading.

So you end up doing two separate practice sessions, on two different nights, and the whole thing feels like homework times two.

Here's the fix I use in tutoring and at home: don't change the game. Change the cards.

Why one deck can't work for both kids

Reading practice only helps when it matches what a child has already been taught. That's not a preference, it's how reading works.

A kindergartner is learning letter sounds and reading short words like "cat" and "sun." A second grader has (hopefully) moved past that and is working on things like vowel teams (the "ai" in "rain"), bossy r (the "ar" in "shark") and endings like "-ed" and "-ing." If you hand both kids the same deck, one of two things happens:

• The cards are easy enough for the younger child, so the older one is just reading words they mastered a year ago. Fun, maybe, but not practice.
• The cards are right for the older child, so the younger one is guessing. Guessing at words they can't yet sound out is a habit we really don't want to build.

Kids need lots of correct repetitions of the patterns they've been taught. The right level is the one where your child can read most of the cards with a little effort, and gets a few wrong. If they're getting everything right instantly, go up a level. If they're guessing on most of them, go down.

So the game has to let each child practice their own patterns. The way to do that is simple: same board, separate decks.

How the leveled board game works

Here's the version I built for the club. It's a jungle-themed board game with 50 spaces and three card decks:

• Explorer deck (K-1): rhymes, first sounds, matching a short word to a picture, a missing vowel, sight words like "see" and "you," counting the sounds in a word.
• Adventurer deck (grades 1-2): magic e, digraphs (sh, ch, wh), blends (st, cr), which spelling is right, finishing a sentence, clapping syllables.
• Trailblazer deck (grades 2-3+): vowel teams, bossy r, homophones ("two" vs. "too"), adding endings like "-ing," reading a sentence and figuring out how a character feels.

Every player rolls, moves and draws a card from their own deck. Right answer, you stay. Wrong answer, go back one space. The board has a few double-ring spaces with arrows: get your card right on an "up" arrow and you take the shortcut. Get it wrong on a "down" arrow and you slide back.

The important part is that a wrong answer costs the same thing no matter which deck you're using. A kindergartner going back one space for "bug" and a second grader going back one space for "through" are having the exact same game experience. Nobody is behind. Nobody is the baby.

The free version you can make tonight

You don't need my printable to try this. You need a board game you already own and a stack of index cards.

Step 1. Pick any board. Candy Land, Chutes and Ladders, Trouble, a Sorry board, anything with a path. Ignore its rules. You just need a start, a finish and a die or spinner.

Step 2. Make a deck for each child. Ten cards each is plenty for one game. Write one question per card and the answer small at the bottom. Here are examples by level, so you're not starting from a blank card:

Kindergarten / early 1st:

• "Which word rhymes with pig? wig, pot, bed"
• "Read this word: fox" (and let them point to the picture if you draw one)
• "What letter is missing? c _ t" (draw a cat)
• "Find the word: you. you, yes, up"

1st / 2nd grade:

• "Add a magic e to tap. What's the new word?"
• "Which sound is missing? _ _ ell (sh, ch, th)"
• "Which blend is missing? _ _ ar (st, sn, sw)"
• "Which is spelled right? wuz, was, wos"

2nd / 3rd grade:

• "Which letters are missing? sh _ _ k (ar, or, ur)"
• "Pick the right word: We saw ___ monkeys. (two, too, to)"
• "Which is spelled right? swiming, swimming, swimmng"
• "Max shivered and zipped up his coat. How does Max feel?"

If your child has a spelling list this week, those words make a perfect deck. Write "Read it, then spell it" on each card.

Step 3. Play with one rule. Draw a card every turn. Right, you stay. Wrong, go back one. That's it. If your board has ladders or shortcuts, use them the same way the jungle board does: a right answer earns the shortcut.

Step 4. Let the older sibling be the checker. Give them the answer side for the younger child's deck. Checking someone else's answer is reading practice too, and it turns the "helping" problem into a job.

Ten to fifteen minutes is a good game. Stop while they still want one more turn.

When your kids are more than two grades apart

A kindergartner and a fourth grader can still play. The younger one uses the Explorer-style deck. For the older one, write cards that are real work at their level: a vocabulary word to use in a sentence, a prefix to explain ("What does 'unhappy' mean?"), or a sentence from their current book with one word to define. The point is the same. Each kid reads at their own level, and the race is shared.

Play it in the club

If you'd rather not make cards, the club has this game two ways.

Journey Through the Jungle is the online version. Two players, each picks their own level (Explorer, Adventurer or Trailblazer), and the game reads the questions out loud, so a kindergartner can play without a grown-up reading every card. It's part of the games library for members.

Jungle Adventure Board Game is the printable version I described above: the board (which kids color), all three decks with answers on the cards, and a blank page for making your own. It's in the printables library the week this post goes up.

Both come with a 7-day free trial of the membership. Try the trial at thediscoveryreadingclub.com/trial. It's $19.99 a month after the week, and you can cancel anytime.

And if your kids aren't quite ready for a board game yet, start with the no-prep games in 5 Reading Games You Can Play at Home with a Struggling Reader.

Talk soon,
Candace