| Knowing how to decode polysyllabic words is essential because reading materials in the third grade, and surely by the fourth grade and beyond, contain an ever-increasing number of unfamiliar polysyllabic words (Chall & Popp, 1996).
What? Phonics refers to the relationship between sounds and the spelling patterns that are used to represent them in print. The study of these sound-spelling (phoneme-grapheme) relationships is generally included in beginning reading instruction. However, phonics instruction does not end in the primary grades (grades K-2). Advanced phonics (grade 3 and up) builds on the primary grade skills (consonants, short and long vowels, digraphs, etc.) and enables students to read multisyllabic words with complex vowel and syllabication patterns.
When? The following skills are covered in an advanced phonics curriculum:
- review of skills taught in the primary grades, specifically long vowel patterns, r-controlled vowels, and diphthongs (a speech sound in which the position of mouth must change)
- the six most common English syllable patterns
- affixes (prefixes and suffixes)
- Greek and Latin roots
- decoding practice on words with 3-5 syllables
The goal of advanced phonics is to help students not only decode words, but to also determine their meanings.
Why? After students grasp the alphabetic principle (the concept that letters stand for sounds) and learn the most common sound-spellings and monosyllabic words, their next hurdle is decoding multisyllabic words.
Who? Some older students find it difficult to read multisyllabic words. They don't recognize common spelling patterns or larger chunks of the words and often can't sound out the words. However, many words that students encounter in books are not in their speaking or listening vocabularies. Knowing the meanings of these unfamiliar words is critical to understanding the text, and learning advanced phonics skills helps to unlock word meaning.
An Example Understanding prefixes is an important aid in decoding a word and determining its meaning. Words such as "relevant" and "irrelevant," and "play" and "playful" have very different meanings. In addition, knowing common syllable patterns is essential to sounding out unfamiliar words in text.
Special Education Focus: From Sound to Sentence
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Lessons for very poor readers and spellers must be structured, systematic, cumulative, and multisensory. Progress gradually from closed syllables and their combinations to open syllables, consonant + le, vowel + silent e, r-controlled vowels, and vowel teams.
Give extra attention and practice with subskills that involve attending to sounds and symbols:
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Phonemic Awareness: Tell the student to listen and then tell you what sound is at the end of these syllables. Say the sound aloud:
mo (/o/); pem (/m/); fe (/e/), nop (/p/)
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Print Awareness: Tell the student to mark the short vowel in the syllables that end in a consonant with a breve (˘). Then ask him to mark the long vowels in the syllables that end in a single vowel letter with a macron ( ¯ ). Now, the student should go back and read the syllables.
strop ro clum twick spi qua utch
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Ask the student to read at least thirty real words with each syllable pattern. Then have him read sentences that use those words.
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