|Kindergartener's using sound boxes|
Within a minute or so, the children had the hang of it. They were problem solving by segmenting CVC words into sounds and pushing each sound into a box and then trailing a finger under all of the boxes to blend the sounds into the initial word. We next transitioned to writing words using the sound boxes as needed. The children were eager to try this, so we had a go of it. If they could write the word without assistance of the sound box, they did. If not, they used the sound box in order to hear the separate sounds--most often the short vowel. We worked for about 6 minutes or so and they had a substantial list of words with several short a and short o words, and two short e (often tricky) words.
This was joyful and successful work. I love to watch children learning.