Listen for the Rhyme!

Here are four words: cat, hat, sun, mat. Three of them sound alike at the end. Can you hear which three match? Say them out loud and listen carefully to the ending sound. Words that share the same ending sound are called rhymes. Poets use rhymes on purpose — they make poems fun to say and easy to remember. Today you are going to become a rhyme detective!

Two words rhyme when their ending sounds match. Listen: 'night' and 'light' — both end in the '-ight' sound. 'Rain' and 'train' both end in the '-ain' sound. The beginning of the word can be totally different — only the ending sound needs to match. Poets arrange rhymes in patterns. A rhyme scheme is the order in which rhyming lines appear in a poem. We label each line with a letter to show the pattern. If line 1 rhymes with line 3, they both get the letter A. If line 2 rhymes with line 4, they both get the letter B. This ABAB pattern is one of the most common rhyme schemes you will find. Here is a short poem: The stars shine bright at night, (A) The moon glows big and round, (B) They fill the sky with silver light, (A) While silence fills the ground. (B) 'Night' and 'light' rhyme — they are both A. 'Round' and 'ground' rhyme — they are both B. The pattern is ABAB. Sometimes lines that are next to each other rhyme. That is called a rhyming couplet. 'Jack and Jill went up the hill / To fetch a pail of water' — 'hill' and 'Jill' rhyme in the same pair of lines.