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This article
was written by Megan Goss, a reading consultant here at Let's Go
Learn, Inc. She lives with her husband and two children in
Sonoma County, California. In addition to her other endeavours,
Megan works with inner city kids in Oakland, California to
improve their reading skills. We think her expertise in the
field as well as her experience with her own kids makes her a
fountain of information. In this article, she gives great advice
about working with short vowels for beginning readers. Enjoy!
AmyPedigo
Director of Education
Let's Go Learn, Inc.
Short Vowels
As adults, we often laugh when we
remember reading sentences like, "The tan man ran to the
fan." There is, of course, a reason why many primary
teachers use these funny sentences with short, rhyming words;
small words like 'fan' and 'man', which contain short vowel
sounds, are a natural starting point for introducing decoding in
reading. One reason for this is that these three letter words
are reliable - the letters used to form
consonant/vowel/consonant words will almost always sound the way
they should sound, without any confusing, unpredictable letter
combinations like 'th' or 'sh' to throw off an emerging reader.
These short words are also friendly, in that they easily form
rhymes, and are small enough to be easily managed by beginning
readers. Finally, they are usually fairly common words (fun,
sun, man, zip, etc.), and many letter combinations can be used
to form a great number of words.
Children who know all or most
letter sounds, and can match these sounds to the letters they
see, are quite ready to start putting these letter sounds
together to form short vowel words. It is often helpful to focus
on one vowel at a time when short vowel words are first
introduced. The letters 'a' and 'o' are often taught first,
since they have more 'unique' sounds, and the sounds of the
short vowels 'e' and 'I' are similar, and thus can be easily
confused (think of the words 'pen' and 'pin', for example).
Start with a few words that are very similar. For example, the
words 'man', 'tan' and 'ran' work well. You can introduce these
words in many ways, but one that works well with young children
is using letters they can move around - refrigerator magnets,
for example. You can also write them slowly as you say each
letter, so your child can see you forming the words. Small
dry-erase boards work well for this, since you can amend what
you write and you won't waste so much paper.
You will want to start by telling
your child that you will be working on words with an 'a' in
them, and by reviewing the short sound that this letter makes.
You can remind them that 'a' can make other sounds too, but try
not to emphasize this, since it will become confusing. Begin by
having the child sound these words out letter by letter. At
first, you may need to help with reminders of the letter sounds.
After a few lessons, you will want to encourage your child to
see the words more wholistically. For example, if you start with
words 'man', 'tan' and 'ran', you will want to get to the point
where your child sees the
'-an' part of these words as a
base to which you can add many different beginnings. If you use
refrigerator magnets, you can encourage this by forming the
'-an' with the letters, then placing different consonants in
front of this base to form new words.
As you work with your child, try
to encourage him/her to take over and write or form new short
'a' words after you have provided several demonstrations on how
to do this. After working on '-an' words (man, fan, etc.) for
several lessons, branch out to other short 'a' words - maybe
'-at' words (mat, fat, sat, etc.). Use the same methods, where
you build and pronounce the words using the '-at' as the base.
This process should become comfortable and familiar, and you can
move on to other short vowels soon. Be sure to compare and
contrast new sounds, and review often.
Many strategies can and should be
employed outside this lesson, to supplement and enhance what is
taught here. Using books for beginning readers that focus on the
particular vowel you are working on (***do a reference here to
the other article I am doing on choosing early reading
books?****) will help your child transfer this burgeoning
knowledge into actual text reading. Pointing out short vowel
words you encounter in the environment (i.e. - when you are in
the store, driving by a sign, at home reading labels, etc.), and
encouraging your child to read them when you see them in the
world will serve as a reminder of what you are teaching. It will
also show that what you are teaching is useful in the 'real
world'. It is also an excellent idea to have your child write
these words. Say them slowly: "M…A…N." Then have
your child write 'man', as well as several words like it. This
activity reinforces what you are teaching and helps transfer the
reading skills you are teaching into the writing arena.
Finally, try to make these
activities fun, playful and enjoyable. Children are excited to
be initiated in to the adult world of reading, and making it a
pleasurable experience keeps them wanting to learn more.
Megan Goss 2001
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