How to Use a Digital Sound Wall: A Teacher's Guide to Swipe the Sound Wall
Swipe the Sound Wall is a free digital sound wall for K–2 phonics: all 44 sounds, how the mouth makes each one, and every common way to spell them. This guide shows how to teach with it on a phone or a classroom projector.
A sound wall puts the sounds of English first. Each sound comes with how the mouth makes it, and then with the letters that spell it. Swipe the Sound Wall is a free digital sound wall for grades K–2. It has all 44 sounds, more than 150 spellings, and more than 400 example words, each with a picture and a recording.
It runs in the browser, on a phone or on a classroom projector. There is no account. This guide walks through each feature and how to use it with a class or a small group.
Sound wall or word wall?
A word wall sorts words by their first letter. A sound wall sorts by sound: stops, nasals, fricatives, short vowels, long vowels, and so on. Children see what their mouth does for each sound, and then the spellings for it.
That matters because English spelling does not map one to one. In the lab, /ā/ has eight spellings, from cake to vein. And one spelling can make several sounds: ea is in bread, steak, seat, earth, and bear. A sound wall shows both directions.
How the feed works
The lab shows the sounds as a vertical feed, like short video.
- Swipe up for the next sound, and down to go back.
- Swipe sideways through that sound's slides. The first slide is the key word, with the mouth above it. Each slide after it is one more spelling.
- Tap a spelling in the row under the caption to go straight to it.
- Each spelling has up to three words. The dots on the card go to each one.
The feed never moves on by itself. After sound 44, it stops and says so. You can start again, shuffle, or open the whole wall.
The mouth panel shows a side view and the lips from the front. It names the kind of sound (Fricative, Long vowel), says if the voice is on or off, and gives a short cue, such as "Round your lips and push them forward. Blow a quiet shh." While the sound plays, the mouth moves through it. Tap the speaker to hear the sound again.
One part per tap: read the word before the picture
By default, a slide shows one part per tap:
- The sound and the mouth (on the key word), with the spelling.
- The word, for the child to read.
- The picture, and the word said aloud, as the check.
The order is on purpose. A picture, or a voice, gives the word away. If the picture comes last, the child decodes the word first, and the picture confirms it. The caption keeps the key word back until it shows, too.
After the last part, the next tap brings in the spelling's second word, and then its third. The hint under the caption always says what the next tap brings.
Three routines, or your own
Open Settings to pick a routine.
| Routine | What a slide does | Use it for |
|---|---|---|
| Teach a new sound | The sound and the mouth, then the spelling, the word, and the picture | Introducing a sound |
| Review | The spelling first, silent, so the child says the sound. Then the sound, the word, and the picture | Warm-ups and quick checks |
| Show all | Every part at once | A reference card, like a sound wall on the classroom wall |
You can also make your own. Turn any part off, or move it earlier or later. Choose whether the spelling says its sound as it appears. Choose when the word is said: with the picture, with the word, or only when you tap Again. Turn off Three words per spelling for a quicker pass with one word each. The lab remembers your settings on that device.
Teaching order or UFLI order
The tabs at the top choose the order of the feed:
- Teaching starts at /m/ and moves through the phases of a common phonics sequence. The caption tags each sound with its phase.
- UFLI puts each sound at the UFLI Foundations lesson that first teaches it. The caption names that lesson and the later ones that come back to the sound.
- A–Z sorts by first spelling, and Shuffle mixes the sounds for review.
The Wall button shows all 44 sounds at once, as tiles. Arrange them by sound type, by teaching order, or by UFLI lesson. The UFLI view lists every unit of the scope and sequence with the sounds it first teaches. Open a unit to see all its lessons, each linked to the slide of the spelling it teaches. Schwa and /zh/ have no UFLI lesson of their own, so they come last. The lab is not affiliated with UFLI.
Search sounds, spellings, words, and lessons
Tap the magnifier to search. You can type a sound (/zh/), a spelling (igh), any word (treasure), or a UFLI lesson (lesson 84). A result opens the sound on the slide that matched.
Search ea to show a class that one spelling can make five sounds. The search runs on the device, with nothing sent to a server, so it keeps working offline once the lab is on your home screen.
Save sounds and share a link
- Save (the bookmark beside each sound) keeps a sound for practice. The Saved tab plays only your saved sounds, in teaching or UFLI order, whichever you chose last. Use it for the sounds a small group is working on. Saved sounds stay in the browser on that device.
- Share sends a link to that sound, such as /sh/ as in ship. The link preview shows the sound and its spellings.
On a projector
On a wide screen, such as a laptop, a projector, or a tablet on its side, the lab changes its layout. The mouth stays beside the pictures, and a strip of every spelling runs below. Click a spelling in the strip to go to it. Press M to hide the mouth and make the pictures bigger.
It also works with a keyboard or a presentation clicker:
| Key | What it does |
|---|---|
| ↑ ↓ | Previous or next sound |
| ← → | Previous or next spelling |
| Enter | Show the next part |
| Page Up / Page Down | A clicker: every part, then the next spelling, then the next sound |
| Space | Hear it again |
| W / S | The wall / saved sounds |
| / | Search |
| M | Show or hide the mouth |
| Esc | Close, or leave the wall |
The same list is in the settings panel on a projector.
Keep it on your home screen
Swipe the Sound Wall installs like an app. After you look at a few sounds, a tip near the bottom of the screen shows how:
- iPhone or iPad: in Safari, tap Share, then Add to Home Screen.
- Android: tap Add on the tip, or Install app on the wall (Chrome, Edge, and Samsung Internet).
- Opened from Instagram, Facebook, or TikTok? Open the page in your browser first. The browser built into those apps cannot add it.
From the home screen, the lab opens full screen, without the address bar. The sounds and pictures you have played keep working without the internet. If you close the tip, it waits a month before it asks again. If you swipe on without closing it, it goes away and comes back on your next visit.
Ideas for the classroom
- Introduce a sound. Use Teach a new sound on the projector. Let students copy the mouth, say the sound, and read the word before you tap for the picture.
- Warm up with Review. The spelling shows first, silent. Students say the sound before they hear it.
- Work with a small group. Save the sounds the group needs, then play the Saved tab on a tablet or a phone.
- Connect sounds to reading. A sound is learned when students read it in text. After a lesson, make a short passage that practices it.
For the same 44 sounds in 3D, with every spelling as a tower, try The Sound Table. All our free classroom tools are in Labs.
FAQ
Is Swipe the Sound Wall free?
Yes. It is free, with no account and no sign-in. Open readingfluency.app/labs/sound-wall on any phone, tablet, or computer.
Which pronunciation does it use?
General American English. The example words were chosen so that each spelling makes the sound in General American.
What grades is it for?
It is made for K–2 phonics, and for older students in intervention who need to review sounds and spellings.
Does it follow UFLI Foundations?
It can. The UFLI order and the wall's UFLI view follow the UFLI Foundations scope and sequence, lesson by lesson. The lab is not affiliated with UFLI.
See what this could look like in your classroom.
If you want to spend less time on assessment logistics and more time helping students read, these pages show a few practical ways ReadingFluency.app can help.
After you teach a sound on the wall, make a short passage at the right grade to practice it in connected text.
Check that the sounds you teach show up in students' oral reading, and keep every score in one place.
Ready to try it with a real student passage?
You can start a reading fluency assessment in about 30 seconds, then keep the passage, score, and follow-up notes together in one place.
Start in 30s