Dividing words into syllables

This week we have been learning all about closed syllables, and the short vowel sounds that are associated with closed syllables. However, students must first be able to divide words into syllables before deciding what kind of syllable they are working with.

Of course there are always exceptions to these rules, but for our purposes, we use the following rules when dividing words into syllables

VC-V

VC-CV

VC-CCV

VC-CV

Here, Tate is dividing words into syllables and tapping each syllable before tackling the whole word. This is much less intimidating for students who are just starting with multi-syllabic words. This same principle is used for spelling, only in reverse. This is a very powerful concept for emergent readers because they can read some very sophisticated words, and are armed with the strategies to spell multi-syllabic words without memorization.  

An activity we work on in class includes word cards. These cards contain words form the very beginning of Wilson. During this activity students made piles of words according to the number of syllables in each word

This is a great opportunity for reviewing the rules for syllable segmentation. Most of the time, students count the vowels and believe that is the number of syllables. many times this works, but we have to be careful of the chicken letter (qu) and of course vowel teams which we will work a lot with later this year.