Phonics Midterm Review

What is a stressed syllable?

A syllable that is longer, louder, and higher in pitch, making the vowel sound easier to identify.

What is an unstressed syllable?

A syllable that is more difficult to hear and is often the source of spelling errors.

What is a schwa?

An unclear vowel sound in an unaccented syllable, noted in dictionary re-spellings as 'ə'.

How does syllable stress affect meaning?

It can change the meaning of words, as seen in 'CONtract' vs. 'conTRACT' and 'REcord' vs. 'reCORD'.

What is a common pattern for stress in nouns?

The first syllable is often stressed, as in 'TAble'.

What is a common pattern for stress in verbs?

The second syllable is often stressed, as in 'deCIDE'.

What types of sounds can occur in unaccented syllables?

Schwa sounds, which can be represented by any vowel grapheme.

What is the significance of dialect in syllable stress?

Different languages have varying stress patterns; for example, Spanish often stresses the second-to-last syllable.

How does the schwa sound differ from short 'u'?

The schwa is a reduced vowel sound that can sound like a reduced 'i' or 'u' in certain words.

In which languages is stress predictable?

In Spanish, stress is often predictable on the second-to-last syllable.

How does stress differ in French and Japanese?

French has a similar tone for each syllable for even rhythm, while Japanese has minimal stress.

What is a common occurrence of schwa in words?

The letter 'A' is commonly a schwa at the beginning and end of words, such as in 'Alaska' and 'alone'.

What is a closed syllable?

A syllable that contains a single short vowel closed by two consonants, making up about 43% of words in English.

What are the two types of closed syllables?

Regular (e.g., napkin, helmet) and Double Medial Consonant (e.g., rabbit, rubber).

What is the Rabbit Rule?

In a two-syllable word, if the first vowel is short and there is one consonant sound between vowels, the middle consonant is doubled (e.g., kitten, muffin).

What are the characteristics of a consonant + le syllable? Cle

The -le stays with the consonant before it and makes a schwa sound, typically found at the end of a word (e.g., drizzle, staple, turtle).

What types of consonant + le syllables exist?

Types include -ble, -dle, -fle, -gle, -ple, -tle, -zle, and -cle.

How should Cle words with ng and nk be treated?

Include the g and k in the Cle and the first syllable (e.g., jungle, ankle).

What is a vowel vowel syllable? V.V

A syllable containing two vowels together that do not form a team but split (e.g., lion, neon, create).

What defines an open syllable? V/CV

A syllable that ends with a long vowel sound and is not closed in by a consonant (e.g., hi, me, go).

What is a vowel team? VV

Two vowels (or a vowel and consonant) that stay together in their syllable, common in Anglo Saxon words (e.g., rain, right, few).

What is a vowel consonant e syllable? vCe

A syllable that contains a silent e at the end, making the previous vowel long (e.g., recite, compute, cute).

What warnings should be considered when teaching vCe syllables?

Avoid v-re due to the r, and u_e should be taught separately since it has two sounds (e.g., mule, June).

What happens to r-controlled vowels in v-re syllables? Vr

The silent e changes the r-controlled vowel to a long vowel, making the r sound like /er/ (e.g., bare, hire, care).

What are the two rare spellings for the /er/ sound?

-ear (as in learn) and -our (as in journey).

What is an example of a word with an r-controlled vowel?

Words like 'car', 'her', and 'fur' contain r-controlled vowels.

Graphemes

Visual representation of a sound - not just letters

At the end of a multi-syllabic word, /ick/ is spelled

ic

When a word begins with kn

the k is silent as in knit

When a word begins with wr

the w is silent as in wrong

when a word begins with gn

the g is silent as in gnash

Glued sounds

vowels pronounced along with a consonant

glued sounds

all, -am, -an, -ng, -nk

when identical consonant letters are next to each other

only one is usually heard as in letter, call, and cannon

English words do not end in

j, v, or i

-dge

short vowel marker, you can never hear the d

-ge

after a long vowel or consonant l, n, or r

-dge

after a short vowel

Short vowel markers

-ff, -ll, -ss, -zz, -ck, -tch, -dge

Short vowel marker rule

at the end of the word, after a short vowel

Wh

old english, questions, wind words

Consonant Diagraphs

sounds in a syllable represented by two or more consonants that represent a single phoneme

End consonant digraphs

-ch, -ck, -ff, -gh, -ll, -mb~, -ng, -ss, -th

Final consonant blends/ clusters

-ld, -mp, -lk, -sk, -st, -ft, -lt

Consonant Blends/Clusters definition

sounds in a syllable represented by two or more consonants that are blended together - without losing their own identity

Consonant Blend/Clusters

15/21 initial blends contain r or l

How many consonant phonemes are there?

25

How many consonant phonemes are single letters?

18

How many consonant phonemes are two letter combos?

7

Two letter consonant combinations

/ch/, /hw/, /ng/, /sh/, /th/, /TH/, /zh/

17 Consonant letters with consistent phonemes

b, d, f, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, q, r, t, v, w, y, z

4 consonants with inconsistent phonemes

c, g, s, x

Best bet order /k/

c, k, -ck, -ke

use k before

i or e

use -ck

short vowel marker

use -ke

magic e 

before anything else

use c

use -k

at the end of a word after a vowel team, r-controlled, or a consonant

How many vowel phonemes are there?

19

vowel

sound represented by a, e, i, o, u, (sometimes y and w)

Schwa

usually an initial sound - about, around

What vowel can be a schwa

every vowel

schwa only shows up in

an unaccented syllable and in multisyllabic words

what vowel sounds are voiced

everyone

each vowel is produced with

an open mouth

Every syllable must have

a vowel sound

each vowel pattern fits into these grapheme patterns

single letter, VCe, vowel team, vowel -r

All vowels have at least 

4 sounds

Lax sounds

short vowel sounds

short vowel sound

lax

long vowel sound

tense

r-controlled vowel sound

vowel followed by r

schwa vowel sound

unclear sound in an unaccented syllable

short vowel generalization

When a word or syllable has only one vowel and ends with a consonant, the vowel is usually short. This is referred to as a closed syllable. (ex. Cat, fish) cat is a cvc word, has a short vowel sound, is a closed syllable word.

vowel nasalization

a vowel before a nasal consonant is automatically altered

vowel raising

When a lax vowel is placed before a back consonant, the vowel is raised to sound like the tense vowel above it.

It prepares for the consonants k, ng, g

Best bet order /a/

a

Best bet order /e/

e, ea

Best bet order /i/

i, y (hymn)

Best bet order /o/

o

Best bet order /u/

u, a (equal)

4 Part Processing Model

Phonological Awareness Continuum #1

Rhyme

Rhyme

matching the ending sound of words (cat, mat, bat)

Phonological Awareness Continuum #2

Alliteration

Alliteration

Identifying groups of words that begin with the same initial sounds (sarah sells…)

Phonological Awareness Continuum #3

Sentence Segmentation

Sentence Segmentation

Breaking up sentences into spoken words

Phonological Awareness Continuum #4

Syllable Segmentation

Syllable Segmentation

Blending syllables to say words or breaking up spoken words into syllables

Phonological Awareness Continuum #5

Compound Words

Compound Words

Blend and segment spoken words into two separate words (foot ball)

Phonological Awareness Continuum #6

Onset & Rime

Onset & Rime

Blending and segmenting initial consonant or consonant cluster (onset) and the vowel consonant sounds spoken after it (rime). 

Ex. /d/ /og/ “dog”

Phonological Awareness Continuum #7

Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness

1. Isolation

2. Blending

3. Segmentation

4. Addition

5. Deletion

6. Substitution

Decoding

Reading

5 Pillars of Reading Instruction

Phonics, Phonemic Awareness, Fluency, Comprehension, Vocabulary

Encoding

Writing

Phoneme

smallest unit of sound