Friday Tip

Our theme for October is "Autumn" all of our writing, and many of the books selected for read aloud this month will follow our autumn theme.  Soon we will be looking at multiplication as repeated addition using pumpkin seeds, and we will conclude the month with a trip to the Lazy 5 Ranch pumpkin patch!

Marking Words

Marking words is a very important part of learning how to be strong readers. Words should always be "marked-up" before taping. For example, the word chess has 5 letters but only 3 sounds.  This can be confusing if the word is not marked first. We do not tap /c/-/h/-/e/-/s/-/s/, but rather we scoop the syllable first (this is a good habit to start with single syllable words so that students get in the habit before multisyllabic words). Next underline the digraph, we star the bonus letter and mark the vowel as short or long.  Now we only have to tap the three sounds /ch/-/e/-/s/.