Letter Sounds

What does my child need to know?

As your child starts to read and write, they will need to learn about different rules for letter sounds and spelling. This can be tricky. Because English is made of words from many different languages, the spelling rules are not consistent. Encourage your child to memorize tricky words that they commonly use. Other words can be sounded out by saying the word slowly and identifying each sound.

These skills are important to advanced students as well. They will have to sound out words they may never have heard before. Also, they will have to spell increasingly difficult words. If they know the rules of English, it will help.

Sound Wall

These pictures and recordings will help your child say the sounds correctly.

Most letters in English are voiced. If you put your fingers on your neck, you can feel it vibrate.

A voiceless sound is just air. Nothing happens.

Game: show a video of the letters on mute. Turn your back to the video and the child must make the letter sound and you guess the letter!

Letter Reversals

Several letters in English look very similar. Here are some pictures to help us remember which one we are reading or writing.

EAL - b/d reminder

EAL - p/q reminder

Diagraphs

In English, there are consonant pairs that make one new sound together. These are called digraphs.

th sh ch ph ng nk

th sound

soft th

hard th

sh sound

ph sound

ng & nk

Click here to get more digraph videos from Scratch Garden and Rock 'N Learn

Ghost Pairs

There are consonant pairs that make one sound and the other is silent.

kn (know, knife) wr (write, wrong) mb (comb) wh (where, why)

igh

Other combinations can make a single sound

qu (queen) ck (click) igh (night, fight, light, sight) sch (school) tch (watch, catch)

In English, double consonants are pronounced the same as single consonants.

ff (stuff) ll (fill) mm (swimming) pp (stopped) ss (loss) tt (fitting)

Silent gh and the f sound gh ADD

Vowel Sounds

Vowel Studies

Blending Consonants

Some words have 2 or 3 consonants together at the beginning. We need to practice making these sounds together. It is called "blending."

I have colouring activities from TPT and games from Twinkl.

C and G - Is it soft or hard?

Usually, 'c' makes a hard sound, like in "cat."

If it is followed by 'e,' 'i,' or 'y,' it makes a soft sound like 's.'

For example: Mice have nice faces.

Usually, 'g' makes a hard sound, like in "go."

If it is followed by 'e,' 'i,' or 'y,' it makes a soft sound like 'j.'

For example: It was a huge, magic gem.

This song is very fast! Can you sing it?

Knowing about soft 'c' helps us choose which letter to use for spelling.

Reading -ed and -es

Do you remember that some consonants are voiced and some are quiet? Here is a list of them.

This changes the way you say some word endings.

-ed

This can be pronounced 3 ways. You have to look at the letter that comes at the end of the word before the -ed.

-es / -s

This can be pronounced 3 ways. You have to look at the letter that comes at the end of the word before the -es or -s.

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