Syllables for first graders

Tips for Teaching Syllables - Lucky Little Learners

Written by: Jess Dalrymple

There’s no doubt about it – teaching syllables is an important part of reading instruction. After all, this skill shows up in primary grade level standards – regardless of where you teach. But how do you get your students to understand what syllables are, and what are the best ways to practice syllabication once it is introduced?

First, let’s dive into why it’s a benefit to young readers to understand syllables. From there, we will offer some suggestions for strategies and resources teachers can use to make teaching syllables a breeze!

Why do kids need to understand syllables?

When younger kids can hear the different sounds and syllables in words, they will have the foundation to be able to chunk apart and blend together sounds and word parts as beginning readers.

As children progress through grade levels, having a strong understanding of how words are broken into syllables can help them decode, pronounce, and spell longer words. In fact, did you know that over 80% of English words have two or more syllables! So, having a strategy for how to chunk multisyllabic words into single syllables is much more efficient than trying to sound out a long string of letters.

How to Teach Syllables

Download Under Construction HERE

Explain what syllables are

Basically, a syllable is a single vowel sound in a word. This can be confusing for kids because they will want to count the number of vowels they see in a written word. This will take some practice, but it is important to help kids understand that syllables are not single vowels; they are single vowel sounds. Try demonstrating this with a word like “beautiful”. There are five vowels, but when you listen closely, there are three vowel sounds.

beau
ti
ful

Another way to explain is by calling syllables “beats” in words. Try clapping the syllables in students’ names and in names of objects around the classroom. Have students join in as they get more comfortable! Take this one step further and sort the people and objects into groups by the number of syllables.

One more tip: Try putting your hand under your chin to count the number of syllables in words. The number of times your chin drops when you’re saying a word is the number of syllables the word has.

Try it! How many times does your chin touch your hand when you say the word ‘banana’? Your chin should have dropped three times – ‘ba-na-na’. This works because your mouth has to change positions to form a new vowel sound (aka syllable), causing your chin to drop.

Finally, kids will love this video explaining syllables:

Examples of Syllables

‘dog’ – one syllable
‘pen-cil’ – two syllables
‘bi-cy-cle’ – three syllables
‘cal-cu-la-tor’ – four syllables
‘hip-popot-a-mus – five syllables

Here’s a free site called “How Many Syllables” where you can type a word and it will tell you how many syllables, how to divide the word into syllables, and what the primary and secondary syllables are (to help with pronunciation).

4 Strategies for Teaching Syllables

1- Count Syllables

Practicing syllable counting can be simple! Call out the number of syllables in names when dismissing kids to line up for lunch, “If your first name has three syllables, line up.” Or, send kids to their literacy center by telling them to hop for each syllable in their name. “Jess-i-ca, syllable hop on over to the writing center”.

2- Teach Younger Students to Segment by Syllables

When you notice a student struggling to read a longer word, cover up all but the first syllable. Once they sound out the first syllable, reveal the next syllable to sound out, then have them put the two syllables together. Learn more about reading strategies to use with young readers.

3-

Teach Older Students Syllable Division

Look at the word. Mark the vowels.
Determine which syllable division rule (VC/CV, V/CV, VC/V, or V/V) applies.
Cut or mark the word accordingly.
Read the word.

4- Practice Syllables With Poetry

Haikus

Haikus are fun to write! Kids can get creative and write about any topic, but the poem must be three lines long:

1st line – 5 syllables
2nd line – 7 syllables
3rd line – 5 syllables

Limericks

Limericks are also a form of poetry that requires syllable counting!

They are five lines long.
Lines 1, 2, and 5 rhyme with one another.
Lines 3 and 4 rhyme with each other.
They have a distinctive rhythm (based on number of syllables)
They are usually funny.

This site has excellent directions for how to write a limerick.

Resources for Teaching Syllables

Lucky Little Learners has something for everyone when it comes to supporting the teaching of syllables in K-2 classrooms! Our syllables resources are organized by grade level below.

Kindergarten & 1st Grade Syllable Resources

Kindergarten ELA Toothy

syllable counting: 1-4 syllable words

Download Syllable Counting Toothy HERE

1st & 2nd Grade Phonics Toothy

Practice with spelling patterns to master decoding by syllables

Download 1st & 2nd Grade Syllables Toothy HERE

P

honological Awareness Toothy

It’s the Toothy® you know and love, with a twist! This phonological awareness resource includes 45 sets of phonological and phonemic awareness skills. It includes early, basic, and advanced phonological awareness activity sets. Toothy® task kits are highly engaging task card games that allow students to practice skills by answering questions in a fun, motivating way.

Download Phonological Awareness Toothy HERE

2nd Grade Syllable Resources

Phonics Day By Day

Daily review all year with all essential 2nd grade phonics skills, including syllables!

CVC Syllables
CV Syllables
CVCe Syllables
CVVC Syllables
R-Controlled Syllables
C + le Syllables
CV Two Syllables
CVCe Two Syllables
CVVC Two Syllables
Multisyllabic Words

Download Phonics Day by Day HERE

Multisyllabic Words Toothy Pack

Kids get to play the Toothy game while focusing on syllable types and decoding multisyllabic words:

Counting Syllables
Closed Syllables / CVC
Multisyllabic CVCe Words
Open Syllables
Two-Syllable Long Vowel Words
Final Stable Syllables

Download MultiSyllabic Words Toothy HERE

Phonics Centers for 2nd Grade & 1st & 2nd Grade Phonics Toothy

Students get tons of practice with spelling patterns to master decoding by syllables with these resources.

Download Phonics Centers HERE

Download Phonics Toothy HERE

How to Teach Open Syllables in a First Grade Classroom -

Teaching open syllables to your students can help them decode and write a large number of words. Single syllable open syllable words are some of the most common words used in the English language which means they are very important to teach young students. Here is how you can teach open syllables to your first grade, second grade, or kindergarten students.

What do students need to know before you teach open syllables?

If you’d like a complete breakdown of syllable types, you can find that in this post here.

Strong Understanding of Short Vowel Sounds and Consonants

Before you teach open syllables, your students need a solid understanding of short vowel sounds and consonant sounds. Since long vowels “say their name” or make the same sound as their name, it’s wise to teach the short vowel sounds first since they are the more common form of each vowel. It’s also important for students to understand the difference between vowels and consonants.

Understand Closed Syllables

Before we begin to learn about open syllables, it’s important that you first teach closed syllables. You can read how to teach closed syllables here. Closed syllables make up about 50% of the syllables in the English language and also use the short vowel sounds which means you should teach them first. Once students have a solid understanding of closed syllables though, it’s the perfect time to introduce open syllables. Once students know both open and closed syllables, they will have the tools to read about 75% of all syllables in the English language!

Introduce to the Idea of Long Vowel Sounds

Before diving right into open syllables, I like to introduce the idea of long vowel sounds to prepare my students to understand open syllables. We learn that vowels all have a short vowel sound and a long vowel sound. I tell my students that long vowels say their name since this is an easy way to remember the long vowel sounds. We will orally listen to, say, and segment words with long vowel sounds. In this stage, it’s not important if it’s an open syllable or a vowel team as it’s an oral activity.

Why not memorize?

Before I get into how I teach open syllables, I want to say one more thing about how I don’t teach open syllables or any letter sound combination. It might be tempting to just have students memorize lists of words. After all, that’s probably what you did when you were in school. However, the science shows us that this is not an effective or brain friendly method. If I memorize the words so and me, I know how to read two words. However, if I learn that open syllable words end in a single vowel and make a long vowel sound, with practice, I will be able to read any words that fit this predictable pattern. So, the moral is that spending the time to teach syllable types can and will have a big pay off in the end!

How to Teach Open Syllables in First Grade

I teach open syllables in a very similar way to how I teach closed syllables because consistency and repetition pays off! First we review closed syllables. I’ll write words on the board that can easily be turned into open syllables such as wed, shed, hit, and got. We review that closed syllables have a single vowel and end in a consonant or series of consonants. Then I ask students to think about the word closed syllable. I ask what might another syllable type be? They normally come up with open on their own.

Next to the closed syllable examples, I write the word again without the ending consonant: we next to wed, she next to shed, hi next to hit. We talk about how the syllable ends in a single vowel. At least a one or two students typically recognizes a word or two, and I ask them to read it out loud.

We listen to the difference between the words- example wed and we. I ask them to tell me what sound each vowel is making. They already know that e is making the short /e/ sound. They then notice that the e in we is saying it’s own name. I remind them that this is the long e sound.

We take a look at the word again, and I remind them that this is called an open syllable. Why might it be called an open syllable? We realize it’s because it ends in a vowel which means there’s no consonant closing it in. So, the vowel is long.

I show them the open syllable poster with a house with an open door. Just like with closed syllables, I use a hand motion to help them recall open syllables. We put our hands in front of our faces, and then move them to the sides and say “open syllable ends in a single vowel and makes a long vowel sound”.

From here we’ll practice reading open syllable words together. I start with single syllable open syllable words. There are so many important one syllable words in this pattern that make up some of the most frequently used words! These words, according to Oxford Dictionary, rank in the top 100 used words: be, I, he, by, we, she, my, go, so, me, no. If we think about most decodable texts and early reading material, children need to know at least some of these words to be able to read them. It’s very hard to form sentences without using any of these words. So, teaching open syllables is time well spent!

Again, if we teach this spelling pattern, students can read many open syllable words. If we only taught them to memorize me, go, and I, then they can only read me, go, and I.

After we’ve read some words together, we will complete a journal entry to record our learning. I find this very helpful to have the students create the visual in the moment. It also allows them to go back and refer to it later on. I normally do the journal the next day after we’ve reviewed open syllables and read some open syllable words together. It’s better to spread the learning over a few days to ensure that it sticks.

After completing their journal, our work with open and closed syllables isn’t done. We will continue to work with words with both syllable types in many ways. We will map new words and determine if they are open or closed syllables. We’ll also talk about variations such as how the is an open syllable word, but the e is not pronounced with a long e sound due to lazy pronunciation over time. I’ll even explain the schwa sound a bit (but that’s another topic for another blog post).

As we’re writing in our journals or reading together, we’ll point out open syllable words or closed syllable words. Using these skills in other contexts will help to solidify the understanding.

I also really enjoy having students sort open and closed syllables. This is because it helps their brains categorize and sort words as well. We will do this both together and also students practice this independently.

The bottom line is that my student’s reading and writing improves immediately and for the long term as they learn and understand open syllables.

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We teach a child to read in syllables easily. 5 funny games

Teach your child to read by syllables, but nothing works? Do you repeat 10 times, but after a couple of seconds he forgets everything, and all your attempts end in screams and tears? Of course, school is coming soon and a slight panic seizes you, but relax and don't worry. Maybe your child is just not ready yet, or maybe you started wrong. Stay with us and find out everything.

How to teach a child to read in syllables so that he likes it?

If your child already knows the letters, but does not want to learn to read by syllables, most likely you simply did not explain why he needs it. Arguments like “to learn to read”, “to do well in school and be no worse than others” do not work. The child needs to understand why he is doing this at the moment? That is, you must “sell” him the idea of learning to read in syllables so that he wants it himself and is still satisfied.

How to do it?

Start with what your child is interested in. For example, while walking around the city, draw his attention to the poster of a cinema or circus and ask: “Are you interested in knowing which cartoon will be shown in the cinema? Let's honor." Or here is another good example: “Ice cream, what flavor would you like? Let's read what they offer here? Of course, the child will say that he cannot read and ask you to help him. Then you explain to him why you need to be able to read and what is the use of this.

The idea is "sold" - you can start learning!

If your child does not yet know the whole alphabet, then at the same time as learning the letters, you can begin to make small words out of them. Did the child learn two or three letters? For example "M", "U", "I". Excellent! Fold them immediately into the word "MEW" and ask the child who does this. Then ask him to repeat after you syllable by syllable: “meow”, pausing after the first syllable.

Thanks to this approach, it will be easier for the child to read longer words in syllables in the future.

5 fun exercises to teach children to read by syllables

The first rule that all parents should remember before starting to teach anything to their child under 7 years old is no coercion, always translate everything into a game. Then your child will be happy to participate in the process, and you will see the result faster.

Therefore, all the exercises that we have selected for you are in the form of a game.

Surprise eggs

Take some plastic Kinder Surprise eggs and small cardboard cards with letters. Think of a game scenario. For example, put the letters in the eggs that make up the name of the child's favorite cartoon character according to the principle - one egg - one letter. Then call the child and say that you need to find the name of the hero, otherwise he is lost and cannot find his way home. Then begin to open the eggs together and fold the name in such a way that there is a small distance between the syllables, for example "BIN-GO". As soon as you add up the name, ask the child to read it in syllables and call the hero so that he can find his way home.

When the child manages to name all the characters, you can give him the toy characters he called (if there are such toys at home) or turn on your favorite cartoon.

Find a double

Take blocks with letters and together with your child make a syllable out of two letters. For example, let there be a syllable "BA". Say the syllable several times so that the child remembers it. Then ask him to find the familiar syllable "BA" on the pages of any book.

Of course, it may not work the first time. But nothing, praise the child for every syllable found and say that this is just a game and in case of failure you should not be upset.

This exercise develops visual memory well and helps the child get used to syllables.

Let's be friends

What could be more boring than just combining vowels and consonants into syllables? Another thing is to teach letters to be friends so that they make up words. You will need a metal board and letters on magnets. Arrange the letters on the right and left in this order:

Then tell the child that the letters have quarreled and they need to be connected and made friends. Move together the letter "A" to "U" and read what happened - "AU". So the child will understand that connecting letters into syllables is fun and will begin to connect syllables into words with pleasure.

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Also learn to read by syllables with our free games.

Pick me up

In this exercise you will have to get a little creative. Take an A4 sheet and draw a dog on it. Sign the word “SO-BA-KA” under the drawing by syllables. Then take scissors and cut vertically so that you get three equal parts with pattern elements and syllables. Ask the child to read each syllable separately, and then ask the dog to collect and read the word syllable by syllable.

If you have no time to draw yourself, look for similar puzzles in the store.

This fun activity will quickly help your child learn to read long words.

Transformer Word

Blocks or cards with letters are suitable for this exercise. For example, put together the already familiar word “SO-BA-KA” with your child. Read it syllable by syllable and disassemble it into individual letters. Say: “And now you will see how much our “DOG” can give us new words! Let's watch?".

Then make new words from individual letters: "JUICE", "TANK", "BOK", "KO-SA". Make up words in turn, ask the child to read each syllable by syllable and explain the meaning of what they read.

This exercise allows you to learn to read several words from familiar syllables in one session.

Practice with your child every day for 10-15 minutes and in a couple of weeks you will see the first results. Your child will learn to combine letters into syllables and will already be able to read small words in syllables. And most importantly, he will do it with great enthusiasm and pleasure, because the whole learning process is an exciting game.

And if you have no time to experiment and study with your child on your own, enroll your child for a free trial lesson in our online school. See how the lessons are going, if the child likes it, and then decide which way of learning is best for you.

Read also:

How to quickly teach a child to pronounce the sound [Р]? Simple games and exercises!

Why is it important to teach a child to read by syllables?

Why children don't like to read and what should parents do?

Syllables for children

Teaching a child to read in syllables is the dream of many parents, because the ability to read is an important step for every child on the way to adulthood. In addition to the fact that reading skills will be simply necessary for studying at school, the magical world of literature will open before the child. He will not need to ask his parents to read this or that book, because your baby will be able to do it on his own.

How to start teaching a child?

The algorithm of actions is as follows: first, we introduce the baby to all the letters of the alphabet, and then we teach the child to read by syllables.

Acquaintance with letters can begin in early childhood, before the age of three. You can make letters out of cardboard or buy special fridge magnets. Often show the letters to the baby, voicing them. Please note that it is not recommended to name letters the way they sound in the alphabet. This will confuse the child in the further formation of syllables from letters. When showing a picture of a letter, name only the sound.

Start your acquaintance with letters with open hard vowels (A, O, U, Y, E). Then move on to hard voiced consonants (M, L). Next is the turn of deaf and hissing consonants (Ж, Ш, К, Д, Т) and the remaining letters.

Review what you have learned with each new lesson. It's good to learn letters in a playful way, as the child's age is conducive to this.

When all the letters are thoroughly studied, it's time to think about how to learn syllables with your child. Don't rush things. At the age of three or four, not every kid has enough perseverance to learn to read and subsequently read. But it’s time for a five-year-old child to pick up a primer.

Tips for learning to read by syllables

By the way, N. S. Zhukova's primer has the most positive reviews. When you open this manual, you will immediately understand how to explain syllables to a child and then how to teach a child to merge syllables.

For example, this primer deals with the syllable "MA". The picture shows that the first letter of this syllable runs to meet the second. "M" runs to "A". We get the "trajectory of movement" of this letter: "M-m-m-MA-a-a-a-a." And at the same time our syllable.

The child must remember that the first letter goes to the second, and they are pronounced together, inseparable from each other.

The first syllables for your child to read should be simple and consist of two letters (MA, MO, LA, LO, PA, PO). And when the algorithm for reading these syllables is mastered, subsequent syllables with voiceless and hissing consonants will be studied by analogy.