Phonics and Word Identification

Semantic Encoding

processing information by associating it with a story or meaning

Phoneme Blending

the ability to blend two sounds to make a word

Example

Blend together these sounds to make a word: /b/ /a/ /t/ to form bat.

Closed Syllable

syllable that ends in a consonant; vowel has its short sound

Example

hot, help, dog, mistake

Transitional Spelling

use some conventional spelling but still misspell many irregular words

Word Families

a group of words with a shared ending letter group/sound

Example

back, black, stack, shack, quack, lack, tack

Language Transfer

process that occurs when students who are learning a new language transfer knowledge from L1 to L2

Example

Students use what they know about sentence structure in their native language to help them understand sentence structure in the language they are acquiring.

Multisensory Instruction

engages learners with different modalities

Example

hands-on activities, movement, auditory learning

Phonics

the teaching of how phonemes connect to symbols

Prefix

a letter or letters at the beginning of a root word that changes its meaning

Example

re, de, un

Cognates

also called true cognates; words in two languages that share a similar meaning, spelling, and pronunciation

Example

family-familia; computer-computadora; bicycle-bicicleta

Reading Fluency

ability to read with appropriate speed, accuracy, and prosody

R-Controlled Vowel

a vowel followed by the letter r where the "r" that doesn't make its normal short or long sound

Example

In the word, "tiger," the letter e is an r-controlled vowel, as its pronunciation changes because it is followed by an r.

Etymology

the study of the origin and history of words

Suffix

letter or letters at the end of a root word that changes its meaning

Example

s, es, ed, ing, ly, er, or, ion, tion, able, and ible

Inflectional Affix

an affix that changes the form of the root or base word

Example

The inflectional affix, "ed" changes a verb to the past tense.

Inflection Suffix

also known as "inflectional ending", suffixes that change the meaning of a word by determining tense or quantity: -s, -es, -ing, -ed.

Example

run / running

Phoneme Segmentation

the ability to break down a word into separate sounds, as they say and count each sound

Example

How many sounds are there in the word bug? /b/ /u/ /g/? There are three.

Heart Words Approach

students learn to decode the regular parts while memorizing the irregular; supports decoding skills and reduces rote memorization

Vowel-Consonant-E Syllable

has a silent "e" and makes the vowel before it long; this syllable is usually found at the end of a word

Example

name, mice, cake, compete

Contraction (Semantics)

a shortened version of a word or group of words; the removed letters are replaced with apostrophes

Example

do not becomes don't

Encoding

using individual sounds to spell a word

Example

To encode, a student must represent the sounds of a word with letters. For example, the word cat would be encoded as /c/, /a/ and /t/.

High-Frequency Word

a word that appears often in grade-level text; can be decodable or irregular

Example

Words like "and", "the", "as" and "it" are high-frequency words.

Orthography

the standards present in a language's conventions

Example

spelling, capitalization, punctuation, emphasis

Vowel Team Syllable

syllable that has 2-4 vowels that make a short, long, or unique vowel sound

Example

south, enough

Decodable Word

words that follow regular phonics patterns and can be read by applying letter-sound correspondence rules

Example

For a third grader, words like "family" and "afternoon" are decodable.

Morpheme

a combination of sounds that has meaning in speech or writing and cannot be divided into smaller grammatical parts; this includes prefixes and suffixes

Example

write, cat, laugh, box

Reading Comprehension

the ability to read a text and understand its meaning

Example

Jessie read the book and was able to explain to me why the character lied in Chapter 3.

Phoneme

the smallest individual sounds in a word

Example

The word “bit” has three phonemes – b – i – t.

Word Analysis

breaking down words into morphemes, or the smallest units of meaning

Example

Word analysis can be useful as a decoding tool and can help to determine word meaning.

Phonemic Awareness / Sound Awareness

the ability to hear, identify, and re-create individual sounds in spoken words

Example

A student can hear that /b/ makes first sound in the word blue.

Conventional Spelling

know and use basic spelling rules and spell most words correctly

Diphthong

one vowel sound made by the combination of two vowel sounds

Example

the "ou" in south; the "au" in taught; the "oy" in oyster

Consonant Blend

two or more consonants that blend together when decoded, but each retains its own sound

Example

In the word "blue," the letters b and l form the consonant blend, bl.

Stop Consonant Sound

letters with sounds that cannot be stretched without changing the sound

Example

/t/ is an example of a stop sound, as it cannot be stretched out.

Grapheme

a written letter or a combination of letters that represents a single sound

Example

"ph" makes a "f" sound

Explicit Teaching

the process of teaching by communicating clear expectations and giving specific feedback to students

Precommunicative Spelling

use scribble shapes and sometimes letter-like shapes for spelling words but are unable to make the forms

Automaticity

the ability to read words effortlessly

Environmental Print

the print students encounter in their everyday surroundings

Example

signs, logos, labels

Fry Word List

the 100 most frequently occurring words in the English language

Open Syllable

ends in a vowel; the vowel has its long sound

Example

vacant, brutal, agent

Semiphonetic Spelling

some letter awareness, but unable to use all letters in the word

Example

"Play" is spelled p-a

Final Stable Syllable

consonant + -le syllable occurs at the end of a word.

• If the consonant + -le syllable is found next to an open syllable, then the vowel in the open syllable stays long.

• If the consonant + -le is next to a closed syllable, the vowel in the closed syllable stays short.

Example

bugle, candle, bubble, circle, and trample

Phonics / Graphophonemic Principle

using the relationship between symbols (letters and words) and sounds of a language to read and write

Continuous Consonant Sound

letters with sounds that can be lengthened or stretched

Example

/s/ is an example of a continuous sound, as it can be held out indefinitely!

Consonant Digraph

two consonants that make a single consonant sound when together in a word

Example

In the word "wish," the letters s and h form the consonant digraph, sh.

Word Web

a form of scaffolding which helps students to understand and retain new words and concepts

Example

During reading, as students encounter each word, they write down around the word different words or phrases that will help them remember the meaning.

Phonetic Spelling

spell the way they hear the word pronounced

Example

"Made" is spelled m-a-d.

Homophones

words that are pronounced the same as another word but have a different meaning and may be spelled differently

Example

carat, carrot, caret: to, too, two

R-Controlled Syllable

syllable that contains a vowel followed by the letter r; the r controls the vowel and changes the way the vowel is pronounced

Example

car, guitar, mother, and manor

Commonly Confused Words

words that have similar meanings, spellings, or pronunciations, leading to confusion during literacy development

Example

new vs. knew; affect vs. effect

Vowel Digraph

two vowels that make a single vowel sound when together in a word, also known as "vowel teams"

Example

the "ai" in paint; the "ee" in need; the "oa" in boat

Multisyllabic Words

words having several syllables or parts into a word can be separated for interpretation

Example

water, tomato, macaroni

Morphological Awareness

an understanding of how words can be broken down into smaller units of meaning, such as roots, prefixes, and suffixes

Example

Morphological awareness plays a key role in learning to read and identify vocabulary in English.

Decoding

in reading out loud, being able to sound out words by breaking them into simple forms; in reading for comprehension, the understanding of how to read each letter or letter pattern in a word to determine the word's meaning

Syllable

a unit of pronunciation that contains one vowel sound with or without consonant sounds

Example

The word motorcycle has four syllables - mo / tor / cy / cle