Teaching Multi-Syllabic Words
Information & activities to develop word recognition skills
Why Teach Multi-Syllabic Word Reading?
- Poorly developed word recognition skills are the most pervasive and debilitating source of reading challenges.
- Low decoders who have not had explicit instruction in reading multi-syllabic words pronounced fewer affixes and vowel sounds correctly, disregarded large portions of letter formations, and are 2-4 times more likely to omit syllables.
- Decoding instruction often ends with 2nd grade; however, the number of multi-syllabic words begins to dramatically increase in 3rd grade.
- There are many new words in intermediate and secondary material. For example, average students in 5th grade, and above, encounter approximately 10,000 new words that they have never previously encountered in print. Most of these new words have two or more syllables. These longer words are often content words that carry the meaning of the passage, so it is important students have a strategy for decoding them.
Multi-Syllable Jigsaw Puzzles
These jigsaw puzzles are an excellent, FREE, hands-on resource for familiarizing students with multi-syllable words. These puzzles are available for 2-syllable words, 3-syllable words, and 4-syllable words.
2-syllable words: http://resources.sparklebox.me.uk/7000-8000/sb7528.pdf
3-syllable words: http://resources.sparklebox.me.uk/7000-8000/sb7529.pdf
4-syllable words: http://resources.sparklebox.me.uk/7000-8000/sb7542.pdfSyllable Lotto
To play this fun game gather small objects that have different numbers of syllables. Place the pre-selected objects in a basket. Students will take turns selecting an object and placing it on their mat in the square with the corresponding number of syllables.
7-Syllable Types
Did you know there are 7 syllable types...all of which require explicit instruction. These syllable types include:
closed, open, magic e, r-controlled, diphthong, and consonant -le. Click on the link below for a FREE syllable poster.
http://blog.maketaketeach.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/7-Syllable-Types1.pdfStrategies for Decoding Longer Words
Decoding multi-syllabic words requires systematic instruction. Student friendly strategies are necessary for success. Thisreadingmama.com offers easy strategies for just this purpose.
Download FREE strategy posters by clicking on the link below:
http://thisreadingmama.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Strategies-for-Reading-Longer-Words-Pack.pdf