Presentation

  1. 1

    Lay the noun cards in a column: "lemon," "sugar," "snow."

  2. 2

    Read each noun with the child.

  3. 3

    Place the adjective card "sweet" beside "lemon" and read "sweet lemon." Ask, "Does that make sense?" Enjoy the silliness together.

  4. 4

    Move "sweet" to "sugar" and read "sweet sugar." Agree that it makes sense.

  5. 5

    Give the child the remaining adjective cards to match to nouns.

  6. 6

    Read all pairs aloud together at the end.

Extensions, easiest to hardest

  1. Mixing the cards to make deliberately silly pairs and reading them to a friend
  2. The child writes new logical and illogical pairs
  3. Adding an article to each pair and reading the phrase

Control of error

The meaning of the phrase; some sets have color dots on the back of matching pairs.

Ready to move on when the child…

  • Matches all adjectives to logical nouns
  • Explains why a pair does or does not make sense

Try “pink tower”, “tummy”, “diaper”, “grace and courtesy”, or “October”.