A great difficulty in primary school children is the ability to distinguish between soft and hard consonants. Obviously, they need not be memorized, but learn to hear. And for this, the child needs to tell how exactly these sounds are obtained - this will greatly facilitate his understanding.
Always soft and always hard consonants
Not all consonants in our language are either hard or soft. First you need your child to remember those that are only hard: F, W, C, and also always soft: H, W, Y. For this, you can, for example, make a memorial plate where there will always be solid
consonant sounds painted over blue bricks, and always soft over green pillows (the choice of color is based on how these sounds designate in the lower grades).
If the child constantly sees this picture, which you put in his workbook or hang over the desk, he will quickly remember the consonants.
How vowels “command” consonants
Then you explain to the child that the other consonants can be either soft or hard. But neighboring letters will help to suggest this. If after our consonant there is another consonant, then ours is firm. For example: a table. What stands after sound C? So this is a solid consonant.
Vowels, however, “command” the consonant in front of him what he should be. If these are vowels: A, O, U, E, S, then they have only solid consonants. And if it is: And, E, Yu, I, E, then - soft. The soft sign also indicates the softness of the previous consonant .
Educational games
To make it easier for a child to remember, try playing with him. Invite him to put his forefinger on the outside of his palate and say syllables in turn, where there are soft and hard consonants. For example: TA - YOU, ON - NYA. The child, thanks to this, will be able to remember exactly how the consonant sound is obtained. He will understand that with the formation of a soft consonant, the tongue moves as if forward, and its back rises slightly to the sky. But when hard consonants are pronounced, this does not happen.
Throw the ball to the child, calling the syllable with a solid consonant, and let him return the ball to you, having already said it with a soft one. For example: LA - ALE, LO - ALE, ALE - ALE, etc.
At school, students are encouraged to highlight hard and soft consonants using blue and green. Blue is hard and green is soft. Cut a few squares of red, blue and green and suggest to make a mosaic of the word. The child will lay out vowels in red, hard consonants in blue, and soft consonants in green. Take small words for this, from one or two syllables: fish, elephant, branch, chalk , etc.
Play the word chain. You say a word ending in a syllable with a hard or soft consonant, and the child calls the next word that begins with this syllable. Do not forget to determine aloud what consonant, hard or soft was in this syllable: winds - fish - bagels - movies , etc.
If you methodically explain to your child the difference between hard and soft consonants, this will help him to better navigate in the future, while studying many features of the spelling of the Russian language. Good luck to you!