Blending sounds to build words is an enormous part of learning to read. This is also a skill which can be very challenging for some students and they need a significant amount of practice in order to secure this skill. This blog will provide you with lots of different ways to teach blending for reading with examples of how to practice and consolidate this skill.
Table of Contents
Teach Blending for Reading: Development of Skills
As with all skills there is a progression of steps that need to be mastered along the way. Blending sounds is no different, starting with a few sounds orally, up to blending letters to build re more complex words.
- Blend syllables – start with compound words e.g. rain + bow = rainbow.
- Build longer syllable words progressively – pic+nic, fan+tas+tic – say the syllables on at a time and the student builds the word.
- Onset/ rime blending. This way the cognitive load is kept to just 2 parts but the words you build are real words with concrete meaning e.g. c+at. This is a much better word to build than i+t=it which is quite abstract.
- Blend 3 sounds together to build words orally, Use continuous consonants first (m, n, s, z, f, v, r l, ) – give list of possible words that are easier e.g man, men, sun, sam, fan, sum, rim, ram, ran, fan, fin. Use slow model stretching e.g.
“mmmm–aaa–nnn → man”, repeat and speed up until the student gets the word as needed. - Once a student has this established mix up oral blending with blending by reading known sounds to build words.
- Once the student can blend continuous consonants then add any consonant sounds.
- The next step is to teach students to chunk consonant clusters to reduce the cognitive load. Imagine trying to sound out stand which has 5 phonemes. This is 5 sounds to hold and then blend, chance is something will fall out of working memory. However, an onset-rime style approach helps to reduce the cognitive load e.g. st – and as 2 chunks is much more brain friendly.
- Once students can chunk words and blend them then it is time to introduce syllable division. Students learn to chop up the syllables and then blend them together to build longer words. See the video further down the page.
Teach Blending for Reading Level 1: Blend sounds
Here are some ways to teach and practice blending. From experience students need more practice than we realise. This is especially true when we ask students to read and blend from written letters.
Turtle talk/ Cheetah talk
This is my favourite way to practice blending words. The teacher plays the turtle who says the sounds slowly and the student is the cheetah who puts them together and says the word fast. I have 2 puppets which I use for this. Once the student has established the skill you can reverse roles.
Turtle says “mmmm–aaa–nnn” and the cheetah says “man”
Tap down your arm
As you say the sounds tap down your arm from the shoulder. -Beware that if teaching the class need to make sure you are doing this so the students see left to write tracking. Go it down your left arm and tap the sounds with your right hand.
You can also do this as heads, shoulders, hips. This comes from the ELF program which removes left right issues, gives extra practice and gets movement involved.
Model the Sounds and Swipe together
The teacher says the sounds aloud e.g. f a n, the students repeat the sounds, the teacher blends and the students copy. You can do this by showing the sounds by a hand in front of you from left to right (students view) and then swipe your hand as you say the sounds. you sound and the students say the word, repeat all say the sounds.
I spy
A variation of I spy is to say the sounds not the word e.g. I spy a f-a-n.
Finger Blending
Hold up the number of fingers for the sounds in the word. Tap across the fingers left to right (student view) saying the sounds, them sweep your other finger across the fingers to blend the word.
Segmenting sounds – Jump the sounds
Draw boxes or place hoops on the ground. One for each sound in the word. Student says word, then jumps as the say each sound. They say the whole word at the end as they jump out of the final square or hoop. e.g. m – a – t – mat
Teach Blending for Reading Level 2: Read letters and blend sounds
Blending Boards
Blending boards link letters and blending. Use magnetic letters in the circles to spell out the word to be practiced (this is done by the teacher). Students then identify the sounds of the letters. Once the student knows the sounds, move the letters down and say the sounds in order. This links the letters sounds and blending.
Step 1: Teacher puts out magnetic letters
Step 2: student says sounds /f/ /r/ /o/ /g/ – check sounds are known and correct before step 3.
Step 3: Student moves letters down into the square and says the sounds, At the end the swipe across the bottom and say the word.
An extension of this is: say it, make it, write it. e.g. say frog, build it with letters into the circles and then write it below in the squares.
You can also add digraphs here e.g.sh where the s and h share a circle as they make one sound. You can also use dots and dashes to code the words e,g, ship would be:
You can also use the blending board to do letter chaining.
Start with ship, change the sh for l= lip, change the p for t = lit etc
You can do this by changing in the magnetic or wooden letters. Then it can be done written on an erasable board, rub out the letter and change it.
Whiteboards
Write the word onto the board one letter at a time, say the sounds, blend what you have so far, add another letter, blend what you have so far until all letters are written – do not allow students to guess the word.
This can be done as forwards chaining e.g. f, fa, fan
To prevent students guessing you can do backwards chaining e.g n, an, fan
Word Sliders or Spinners
With word sliders of spinners you can teach the students to use chunks. You can either change the initial sound, the final sound or the medial vowel depending on the students level of development.
Word Games – same game just change up the words
Once the student can blend successfully, they need lots of practice to build their fluency. My favourite games to build fluency are:
Uno
Use words on the cards instead which you have to read. My students like to add their own extra cards +20 was popular for a while!
Memory game
Snap
Go Fish
Stealing Game
My favourite game
Fish game
Read a word from the pile, collect a card from the picture pile. Collect the fish, follow any instruction cards, build the picture. The game ends when the picture is complete. Who has the most fish?
Track games
Write the words onto a blank board and read them as you land on them. You get more reading if you use a 1-3 dice instead of 1-6.
Roll and Read Games
roll the dice, read the word and collect counters to match the dice. The game ends when you have a set number of counters. I like to use a board or picture to place them onto rather than counting.
Videos
Here a couple of useful videos which explain the theory also.
Teach Blending for Reading Syllabification
There are many rules of syllable division. I find that just 2 is enough for students to access longer words providing they are decoding words that are in their vocabulary.
- Step 1: vowel consonant chop. Keep any digraphs/ trigraphs together, including twins. e.g. rabb/it, buck/et
- If the short vowel doesn’t work, swap for the long vowel e.g. rob + ot. This way of splitting means the first ‘o’ makes the short /o/ sound as in frog. As this doesn’t work, change the sound of letter ‘o’ to the long sound as in over and you have the word robot.
Notes
Start with 2 sounds or onset rime. I prefer onset rime so you can build real words
Teach students to avoid stopping between sounds.
Articluate the sounds correctly, don’t add extra schwa sounds e.g. cu a tu does not make cat.
Teach student to take a breath before blending
Encourage smooth blending not choppy blending.
Download
Download a 2 page handout which summarises this page here.
For further reading I recommend Reading IS Rocket Science by Louisa Moats. It is not easy to teach reading, teachers need a high level of skill.
