R-controlled vowel Pirates

We learned that the letter r can sometimes get kind of bossy and won't let the vowel next to it talk. It sounds like a Pirate "arrrgh" matey! We played a came called "Find the Buried Treasure".  Half of the kids were R-Pirates and half the kids were golden vowels. The Pirates closed their eyes, I said a word with an r-controlled vowel in it, the vowel treasure kids chose the correct vowel and then had to hide.  The Pirates had to hunt for the vowels and together they wrote the word. They had to think hard to figure out which vowel fit into the correct word because the r's are so bossy. It was a blast!