Step 4) New Phonics Concept:
The teacher introduces a new sound and the corresponding graphemes (written letters). Sometimes the teacher will introduce a few ways to spell the sound. For example, when working on the long i sound, both the igh and the ie spelling pattern will be introduced. Teachers guide students to read and spell words with the targeted spelling pattern. A game will often be inserted here. Here are a few examples of games below:
Spelling patterns will be introduced gradually and systematically.
- For example, the curriculum first teaches that the letter i can say its name (long vowel) when it follows the cvce pattern (magic silent e).
- Further along in the curriculum, students learn that the letter i can also say its name(long vowel) when it is in an open syllable.
- Next, students learn that the letter y sometimes says i at the end of a word.
- Finally, students would learn the vowel team ie and igh say the long i sound.
This process takes time and that is why practice is key!
Step 5) Word work - Word Chains:
Word chains can be done with a whiteboard and dry-erase marker or plastic manipulative letters. Word chains help with automaticity and spelling. There are two variations.
- Teacher guides the student to manipulate a word, one sound at a time, to create a new word.
-Teacher tells the student the new word in its entirety, and the student must figure out what letter they need to change.
Here is an example of a word chain from the UFLI Homework sheets: (https://ufli.education.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/87_HomePractice_UFLI-Foundations.pdf)
*Using manipulative magnetic letters makes this activity even more exciting. If you do not have magnetic letters, do not worry, a whiteboard and dry-erase marker works just as well.
Step 6) Irregular Heart words:
Irregular words are words where some part of the word does not follow the typical sound-letter correspondence. Therefore the atypical part of the word needs to be memorized, or said differently, learned by heart. A great way to understand is to watch the short video from Really Great Reading (https://www.reallygreatreading.com/heart-word-magic). The teacher introduces the heart words to the students, then parents can help students by creating flashcards to practice the already learned heart words. Students can highlight the tricky part of the word, as Really Great Reading says, “Highlight the Tricky to Make it Sticky”.
As part of a routine parents can do two things:
1) Go through the flashcards as the student reads the words, helping to correct and identify the heart part as necessary.
2) Parent says a heart word, child writes the word on their whiteboard. Then they correct together, identifying the heart part as necessary.
