Helping Children Hear Sounds in Words

You want your child to be the one to say the word - for example, kitten - slowly. Don't take over this job for your child. One reason for this is that when a child tries to match a sound to a letter, the child not only relies on the sound he/she hears but also on the place in his or her mouth from which the sound comes. That is, the child not only listens for sounds but also feels sounds in his/her mouth.



It's a sign of great progress if a child begins to hear more sounds in a word even if the child doesn't yet know the letters that match those sounds. The ability to hear, isolate, and manipulate sounds is the essence of phonemic awareness. Don't dismiss this as insignificant just because the process may not yet result in better spellings.



Expect your child to hear and record consonants before vowels. The long vowels will appear in your children's writing before the short vowels. Some consonants are easier or harder to hear depending on where in a word they are placed. An 'm' is easier to hear at the start and end of a word than in the middle of the word, for example.



You want your child to stretch out words, saying them slowly, but to do this without turning every word into a line of staccato sounds. We hope the child who wants to write bl"blanket will say the whole word__ blanket __ then maybe say bl, then an, then ket. You don't want your child to say blanket like this: (a beginning reader/speller will do it this way, but as time goes on your child will notice chunks of sounds)



b l an k e t

/bah/lah/anng/kah/eh/tah



This leads your child to spell a slew of extra sounds. You do, however, want your child to be able to hear individual sounds (when asked to do so) in blanket (/b/ /l/ /a/ /n/l l/k/ /e/ /t/). It's just that usually when we spell, we rely more on the chunks of sounds we hear.



When you want to help your child hear and record vowels, teach into the chunk (you could also call this "the vowel cluster" or "the rime") That is, if you want the child to hear and record the o in stop, help the child hear /op/. the letter o can make sixteen different sounds, but if it is combined with a consonant to make the chunk op, there are fewer options. There are thrity-six rimes, or chunks, like this one that make up most of the words your child will read and write.



Most importantly, (in time) keep in mind that good spellers do not spell most words by sounding them out! Instead, good spellers rely on a whole variety of strategies, including using what they know from other known words to help them spell unknown words. The strategy you you've read about today is only one strategy in a writer's repertoire. Therefore, when you help your child with spelling, instead of making a habit of only saying, "Stretch the word out. What sounds do you hear?" you'll also want to nudge him/her to use all the strategies available to them (as time goes on). "Did you have a go at that word? What strategy did you use?" Don't assume that children are stretching out every word, as you've read about today.