Listening games for kids: sounds, rhythms and rhymes

Hearing is not the same as listening

You call from the kitchen, “Put your shoes on, we’re leaving,” while the dishwasher hums and an audiobook plays in the next room. Your child answers “Huh?” or shows up holding one sock. Their ears picked up every word. The rest happens in the brain: it has to separate your voice from the dishwasher, recognize the words and keep them in order.

That is why specialists separate hearing, which happens in the ear, from processing what was heard, which happens in the brain. For family life, five listening skills are enough to keep in mind.

Five listening skills, explained simply

• Telling sounds apart: Is that the doorbell or the phone? Did you say “cat” or “cap”? Your child has to notice small differences in everyday noises and in speech sounds. Specialists call this auditory discrimination.
• Finding the direction: Where is the siren coming from? Who just called my name? With two ears, your child can work out where a sound comes from.
• Tuning out noise: catching the teacher’s voice in a busy classroom or an announcement at the airport gate.
• Remembering what was heard: three instructions in a row, a phone number, a clapping rhythm. This is often called auditory memory.
• Syllables and rhymes: Does your child hear that “cat” and “hat” rhyme and that “ba-na-na” has three parts? This feel for the sounds of language is called phonological awareness.

Tuning out noise is much harder for children than for adults. A review on noise and learning reports that understanding speech in noise keeps improving into the teenage years, and that with one other person talking in the background, children usually don’t reach adult levels before age 10 (Klatte et al. 2013).

Syllables and rhymes also come up in reading research. A large meta-analysis of 235 studies found that hearing the individual sounds in words is closely linked to learning to read. For rhyming, the link was weaker but still there (Melby-Lervåg et al. 2012). A link does not mean that rhyming games lead to better reading. Our rhyming games are games, not a reading program.

Remembering what was heard is closely tied to working memory. For more on that, read working memory games for kids.

Get your child’s hearing checked first

Before you practice anything, make sure your child’s ears work well. The CDC points out that hearing loss can happen at any time in life, so it is worth watching for signs even if a child passed a hearing screening before (CDC). Signs it lists for children include delayed or unclear speech, not following directions, often saying “Huh?” and turning the TV up too high. It also advises a hearing test before a child starts school.

A common, everyday cause is fluid behind the eardrum after an ear infection or a cold. Older kids may say things sound muffled, and younger ones may turn up the TV. This fluid most often goes away on its own over a few weeks or months (MedlinePlus).

If you have concerns, ask your pediatrician for a hearing screening. They can refer you to an audiologist or an ear, nose and throat specialist if needed.

Auditory processing disorder: a diagnosis for specialists

You may have heard of auditory processing disorder, or APD, from a teacher or in an online quiz. Kids with APD often have trouble making sense of what they hear, mainly speech, even though their ears work (Nemours KidsHealth).

According to KidsHealth, only audiologists can diagnose APD, and most traditional tests require a child to be at least 7 years old. The symptoms can also overlap with ADHD, speech and language delays and learning disabilities.

You won’t find a checklist here, on purpose. Whether a child can’t hear well, is tired, is distracted or really has trouble with processing can’t be sorted out at the kitchen table. The games below suit every child, but they don’t replace an evaluation.

And if your child understands you perfectly well but still doesn’t do what you ask, that is usually about communication and limits, not perception. That is a topic of its own.

Listening games for kids, sorted by skill

These games need little or no material, and many kids know some of them from preschool or elementary school. Each one is listed under the skill it uses most.

Telling sounds apart:

• Guess the sound: Your child closes their eyes. You crinkle foil, jingle your keys or pour water into a glass. What was it? Then switch roles.
• Sound shakers: Fill pairs of small containers you can’t see through with rice, pasta, buttons or sand. Your child shakes them and finds the matching pairs by sound alone.

Finding the direction: In “Where’s the timer?” your child waits in the hallway with eyes closed. You hide a ticking kitchen timer or a phone playing a quiet tune somewhere in the room, and your child follows the sound until they find it. Younger kids can simply point toward the corner you call from.

Picking out what matters: In Simon Says, your child only follows a command that starts with “Simon says,” so they have to catch the start of every sentence, even with quiet music playing in the background. In Tap the Color, you call out a color and your child taps it with the matching hand.

Remembering what was heard: In Clap Echo, you clap a rhythm and your child claps it back exactly. In I Packed My Suitcase, each turn repeats the whole list and adds one more item. In the Instruction Chain, your child hears several small tasks, repeats them and then does them in order.

Syllables and rhymes:

• Syllable clapping: Say names and words slowly and clap once for each syllable. “O-li-vi-a” gets four claps, “Max” just one. Who has the longest name in the family?
• Rhyme pairs: You say a word and your child finds one that rhymes. Silly made-up words count. For younger kids, flip it around: Do “cat” and “hat” rhyme? What about “cat” and “cup”?

You’ll find more games for listening and remembering among our memory games for kids. Start easy, and only make a game harder once the simple version works reliably.

Everyday ways to make listening easier

The other side is everyday life. Background noise affects how well children understand speech more than it affects adults (Klatte et al. 2013). Several of these simple habits come from Nemours KidsHealth’s advice for kids who struggle to listen (Nemours KidsHealth):

• Reduce background noise: turn off the TV or radio when you talk about something important, and skip the music at dinner.
• Get eye contact first: say your child’s name, wait until they look at you, then speak. That way they can use your face as well.
• Speak slowly and clearly: louder does not always help. Short directions with fewer steps are easier to follow.
• Have your child repeat it back in their own words. And make it clear that asking “What?” is allowed.
• Read aloud: your child follows one voice for a long time without it feeling like practice.

Classrooms are often louder than home. If your child struggles at school, ask whether they can sit near the teacher, away from the door.

Do auditory training programs work?

Some computer programs, apps and courses use headphones and specially processed sounds to train listening skills, and some promise better language or better grades. The research behind them is thin.

A systematic review in a journal of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association analyzed 25 studies of school-age children. It found some support for the claim that such programs can improve auditory functioning. But there was little indication that the gains came from the auditory features of these programs, and evidence for effects on spoken and written language was limited (Fey et al. 2011).

For one well-known program of this kind, Fast ForWord, a meta-analysis found no evidence that it is effective for children’s oral language or reading difficulties compared with control groups (Strong et al. 2011).

For your family, that means: these studies looked at training programs, not at the listening games you play at home, and we make no promises about them. Short listening games cost nothing and many kids enjoy them, especially when they get to make the sounds and you have to guess. If an expensive program promises better language, spelling or reading, ask your pediatrician first.

When to talk to your pediatrician

Talk to your pediatrician if you notice any of these:

• Your child often says “Huh?”, wants the TV very loud or doesn’t respond when you call from another room.
• Their speech is developing more slowly than other kids’ speech, or they are hard to understand.
• After a cold or an ear infection, they seem to hear worse for weeks.
• Teachers report that your child often misses instructions given to the whole class.
• You are worried, even if you can’t quite say why.

Your pediatrician will check hearing first and can refer you to an audiologist, an ENT specialist or a speech-language pathologist. The games in this article are time together. They are not treatment.

Frequently asked questions

Further reading

• How to get kids to listen without yelling
• Working memory games for kids and simple everyday tips