PHONICS & DECODING
Chapter 6
BACKGROUND & RESEARCH
By Rachel Jensen
BACKGROUND
*Phonics: how spellings are related to speech sounds
(letter-sound relationships)
*Decoding: using your knowledge of phonics to read
unknown words; also includes structural analysis, onset
and rime, body and coda, and use of sight words
RESEARCH
2 Questions to ask:
1. WHICH phonics skills are
important for children to learn?
2. HOW might you teach these
skills in your classroom?
A teacher must be a phonics
EXPERT in a classroom where
students are still learning to read.
syllabication
onset & rime
body & coda
soft vs. hard sound
r-controlled
CVC
VCe
diphthong
morpheme
EXPLICIT & SYSTEMATIC
There is a need for explicit and
systematic phonics instruction.
Phonics should be part of a
comprehensive reading
program; don’t teach it in
isolation.
Include the systematic code
instruction with the reading of
meaningful connected text.
APPROACHES
5 approaches to phonics instruction:
Synthetic= traditional; children taught to read unknown words by
“sounding it out”
Embedded= NOT systematic; teaching phonics along with
reading actual text; waiting for “teachable moments”
Analogy-based= using knowledge of word families to identify
new words (e.g. knowing the word “might” can help me read the
word “light”)
Analytic= starts with a whole word, and has the student analyze
part of it; studying previously learned whole words to discover
letter-sound relationships
Phonics through Spelling= segmenting spoken words into
phonemes, then writing letters that represent those sounds
PHONICS THEY WILL USE
(Teacher’s Book of Lists is an excellent resource!)
Letter Names & Sounds: There are 26 letters,
but 44 speech sounds. And they are represented 350 ways!!)
Common Rules Governing Letter Sounds
 The C Rule
 The G Rule
 The CVC Generalization
 Vowel Digraphs
 The VCE Final E Generalization
 The CV Generalization
 R-Controlled Vowels
Special Consonant Rules
 Single Consonants
 Consonant Digraphs
 Initial Consonant Blends or “Clusters”
 Double Consonants
 PH and the /f/ Sound
Special Vowel Rules
 Schwa /ǝ/
 Diphthongs
 Y Rules
RESEARCH CONTINUED
By Marilyn Barrett
RESEARCH ON OTHER DECODING SKILLS
Syllabication (segmenting words into syllables)
Onset & Rime: “Word Families”
Body & Coda
body= onset plus vowel
coda = all sounds following the vowel in a syllable
RESEARCH ON OTHER
DECODING SKILLS
Structural Analysis (studying the meanings of
word parts)
*free morpheme= words or word parts, also
known as “root words.”
*bound morpheme= must be attached to a root
word to carry meaning (prefixes & suffixes)
Sight Words
high frequency vocabulary words; best learned
through memorization (more in chapter 8)
SCOPE &
SEQUENCE
pg. 170
ENGLISH LEARNERS (EL)
Phonics instruction is CRITICAL to English learners!
Keep in mind that the basic differences between English
and Spanish languages may cause problems in the
learning of phonics.
e.g. the letter “e” in Spanish has a long /ā/ sound, as with
“eight.”
TEACHING STRATEGIES
Ten Things to Do:
1. Sequence your instruction.
2. Be very direct (explicit AND implicit) in your instruction.
3. Have daily lessons and review sessions.
4. Focus on ONE skill at a time.
5. Keep lessons brief.
6. When practicing a new phonics skill, use easy reading materials.
7. Help kids become “wordsmiths.”
8. Adjust the pace of instruction to meet the individual needs of students.
9. Link phonics instruction to spelling.
10. Make clear what you want kids to do.
TEACHING STRATEGIES
What NOT to do!
1. Avoid round-robin teaching.
2. Try not to direct students too quickly.
3. Avoid drill-and-kill teaching.
ASSESSMENT OPTIONS
By Karen Nelson
PHONICS ASSESSMENT OPTIONS…
Nonsense Word Fluency
Early Names Test
Core Phonics Survey
Starpoint Phonics Assessment (including Analyzing the Miscues)
Running Records
Words Their Way
Sight Word Assessments
NONSENSE WORD
FLUENCY
EARLY NAMES
TEST
CORE PHONICS SURVEY (PHONICS PORTION)
INTERVENTION OPTIONS
By Shellie Rush
PHONICS INTERVENTION OPTIONS…
Phonics Fish Card Game
Tongue Twisters
Creating Nonsense Words
Explicit Phonics Instruction
Letter-Sound Cards
Spelling in Parts
Sound Swirl
“Button” Sounds
Stomping, Clapping, Tapping, and
Snapping Sounds
Making Words
Wide Reading
Word Boxes
Word Detective
PHONICS FISH CARD GAME
TONGUE TWISTERS
I thought a thought
But the thought I thought
Wasn’t the thought I thought I thought!
CREATING NONSENSE WORDS
Example using the –ish word family:
One fish, two fish,
Red fish, blue fish.
One kish, two kish,
Red kish, blue kish.
OTHER IMPLICATIONS / RESOURCES
www.MrsJensen.com
Sight Word activities
Fluency Graph options for keeping track of progress