What does it take for a struggling reader to finally read a short vowel story? In the attached short vowel story free printable (below), a beginning reader must know letter sounds, short vowels and a …
Th Words Phonics (with FREE Printable)
Reading Elephant is a very strong proponent of explicit, systematic phonics instruction. Young readers need teachers to clearly introduce new letter-sound correspondences, including th words phonics. …
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How to Teach Reading Effectively
Brandon, a first grader, read laboriously and often made mistakes. He added words that weren’t in the story and guessed based on the first letter. At the end of the book, he didn’t understand the …
Sh Digraph Game (FREE printable)
When kids learn the sh digraph, they learn that chunks of letters can make one sound. This is a big step. Beginning readers focus on letter sounds, with an emphasis on short vowels. They read words …
Phonemic Awareness Assessment
All beginning readers need a phonemic awareness assessment. A phonemic awareness assessment can help give educators a baseline of a student’s current ability to blend, segment and manipulate sounds—a …
Sh Digraph (with FREE Printable Book)
Jamie was in first grade. She knew some letter sounds, but she wasn’t blending sounds together to read words. Her classmates were reading books with a variety of words, even hard words like “bicycle” …
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Christmas Phonics Book for Kindergartners (Free)
I’ve created a free Christmas phonics book for kindergartners. The attached book includes letter sounds, short vowels, consonant digraphs and consonant blends. Kids can read the attached decodable …
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Teaching Decoding Skills (What Does & Doesn’t Work)
The teacher told Wendy that she simply needed to read aloud to her son, Jackson. He was in second grade and he had not developed decoding skills. When Jackson came across uncommon words, he used the …
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Phonics Stories for Kindergarten
Consonant Digraph Series 2 Now Available! I’m very proud to release my consonant digraph book series. These phonics stories for kindergarten introduce phonics sounds progressively. They are ideal for …
Phonics Letters and Sounds to Review
If you have a struggling reader, teach them how to read using sound cards. To master phonics letters and sounds, students need to see each unit individually. If they learn to recognize phonetic units …
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