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Helping Kids Sound Out Words

When you read, you probably don’t spend much time decoding the individual words. You just read, and as you get to each word, you instantly recognize it. But beginning readers don’t have that kind of instant recall yet, so it is important to teach them how to sound out words.

What Does “Sounding Out Words” Mean?

When you sound out a word, you say each sound in the word slowly (s…i…t), and then say the sounds together more quickly (sit). The technical term for this process is blending because sounds are blended together to form a word. Here’s a quick demo:

Our free Blending Procedure PDF has complete step-by-step instructions for both one-syllable and multisyllabic words.

Blending Procedure Downlaod

Why Is Sounding Out (or Blending) Important?

When a child can say the sounds of the letters in the order in which they appear, and can then blend those sounds into a recognizable word, she is able to read thousands of phonetically regular words.

Because it unlocks so many words, blending is an important step toward the goal of reading comprehension. In fact, research shows that learning to sound out words has a powerful effect on reading comprehension.1

Arrow graphic showing blending as a step toward  the goal of reading comprehension

What Kids Should Know Before Sounding Out Words

Before you attempt to teach your child to sound out words, check to see if he is ready. Here’s a free Reading Readiness Checklist for you to download. If you discover that your child isn’t quite ready for reading instruction, you can use the All About Reading Pre-reading program to prepare.

After you’ve used the checklist to ensure that your child is ready to learn to read, it’s time to teach the letter-sound correspondences of several letters of the alphabet. The letters M, S, P, and A are a good place to start because the sounds are easy to pronounce and several interesting words can be formed right away.

Graphic showing that with the sounds of a few letters kids can read words!

Before we get into the four easy steps for teaching blending, let’s discuss a problem that many beginning readers encounter. Recognizing this problem will help you better understand the steps for blending.

Short-term Memory Issues Can Affect Blending

When kids first learn how to decode three-letter words, they have to juggle several cognitive processes simultaneously:

  • They must recognize the letters.
  • They must retrieve the sounds of those letters.
  • They must hold all three sounds in the memory while they sound out the word.

There is a lot going on in their brains! In fact, it is very common for beginning readers to have difficulty with standard blending procedures. Just about anyone who has taught blending has encountered a situation like this:

Comic strip showing that short-term memory issues can affect blending.

What just happened there? Here’s the problem: by the time the child got to the third letter, he had forgotten the sounds of the first two letters, and then had to resort to guessing. But it’s not that kids can’t remember three things in a row—it’s just that there are too many competing processes going on in their heads at once.

It’s easy to understand the problem. But what can we do to help?

“Cumulative Blending” Solves This Problem

Cumulative blending is quite simple. Start by building a phonetically regular word with the Letter Tiles app or physical letter tiles and then follow the steps below. We’ll demonstrate with the word map.

  1. Touch one letter at a time and say the sound of each letter.
Blending the sounds m-a-p into the word map-Step 1
  1. Go back to the beginning of the word and blend the first two sounds together.
  1. Start over at the beginning of the word. Slide your finger under the letters and blend all three sounds together.
  1. Finally, say the word at a normal pace, as we do when we speak.

This is called cumulative blending because there are successive additions of the letter sounds. First we blend the first two sounds (/mă/). Then we start at the beginning of the word again, this time blending all three sounds (/măp/). If there were more sounds in the word, as in split, we’d start at the beginning of the word for each successive addition:

/sp/

/spl/

/splĭ/

/splĭt/

Cumulative blending provides the extra support, or “scaffolding,” that beginning readers need. When you feel your student is ready, he can try blending all three letters without this additional step, but don’t try to withdraw the support too soon. These steps and the support they provide help memory issues immensely.

Download a Free Blending Lesson

Teaching blending - download a sample lesson

Would you like to see how we teach blending in the All About Reading program? Download this sample lesson!

This is the first lesson in AAR Level 1. The blending activities start on page 4 of the PDF.

The All About Reading program walks you through blending and all the skills your student needs to become a strong reader. The program is multisensory, motivating, and complete. And if you ever need a helping hand, we’re here for you.

All About Reading Product Line

What’s your take on teaching kids to sound out words? Have anything else to share? Let me know in the comments below!

___________________________________
1 University of Royal Holloway London. (2017, April 20). Phonics works: Sounding out words is best way to teach reading, study suggests. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 1, 2017 from www.sciencedaily.com

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Amanda

says:

Thank you for this! We just ordered all about spelling for my older daughter, and I am very interested in the reading for my 2 youngest. These articles really help!

Robin

says: Customer Service

You’re welcome, Amanda! I’m glad the articles have helped.

If you have questions, need help with placement, or anything else, just ask! I’m happy to help!

Cynthia Negron

says:

I appreciate these posts and find them helpful! We are currently using AAR1 and the program is fun and working! I am looking forward to start using it with my next child.

Robin

says: Customer Service

Cynthia,
I’m so pleased to hear that All About Reading is working well for you and your child! Thank you!

Helen

says:

The pre-reading program was a huge help for my twins! The activities laid a solid foundation to build on now that we’re at this stage of blending.

Robin

says: Customer Service

Helen,
I’m so pleased to hear that the Pre-Reading level has prepared your twins so well for reading! Thank you!

Lori B

says:

I first came to the All About Reading program when a friend showed me the spelling program. This was not the program I used with my two older children, but what I was using wasn’t working fit my third child. I have loved AAS for my two younger children. We eventually added the All About Reading program, too. I love the way the two programs interconnect and add to each other. My youngest son has dyslexia, dysgraphia, and ADHD. The program has been wonderful for him. There isn’t any fussing about Reading instruction or Spelling. That is huge, especially for Spelling. The blending aspect has helped him with both his reading and his spelling.

Robin

says: Customer Service

Lori,
Thank you for taking the time to share your son’s story! It’s wonderful to hear that All About Reading and All About Spelling have been so helpful for him. I love that there isn’t any fussing about reading or spelling!

E. T.

says:

So clearly explaind

Kimberly E.

says:

I love this program and the blending procedure! It’s how I taught my son to read and now my daughter is starting level 1! She’s 4 so we are slowly working on blending now that she knows all of her letter sounds

Robin

says: Customer Service

Kimberly,
Thank you for letting us know the blending procedure has worked so well for your son and is now helping your daughter! Exciting to hear!

WLind

says:

I didn’t know you had a YouTube channel! My 3 year old knows the letter sounds and can say them quickly together, but he doesn’t make the leap to the actual word or object it relates to… I’m really looking forward to your level one reading when he gets there!

Robin

says: Customer Service

I’m glad you found our YouTube channel!

Blending sounds into words is a difficult skill and it can have some developmental components, meaning a child may have all the foundational skills to be able to decode words but may not be able to do so until they are older. However, here are some ideas that may help your little one:

First, knowing letter sounds is not the only foundational skill required to be successful with blending. Phonological awareness skills, the ability to hear and manipulate the sounds in language, are essential. Our Fun Ways to Develop Phonological Awareness blog post has an overview of these skills and some activities, but if they are difficult for your child then he will be best off working through our Pre-Reading program. It includes fun activities that gradually build these skills.

Then these ideas are best only after your child finds the phonological awareness activities easy:

Work on oral blending. You say the sounds of a word you are thinking of, and then he blends them into a word. Can he guess a word that you mean if you just say the sounds? Do easy 3-sound words first, like /k/-/ī/-/t/ (kite). This is a game that can help develop his blending skills. If he can blend orally, then he is well on his way to being able to blend written words.

You can make this easier to do it as a part of an “I-Spy” game. Say, “I spy with my little eye something that sounds like /s/-/ŏ/-/k/.” (Choosing something that is within your child’s line of sight makes it easier.)

Let him say sounds for you to blend too, even if they make nonsense words. Laugh and have fun with it! Hearing you blend sounds can help him begin to hear how individual sounds change slightly when they are blended.

If you are on our Facebook Support group, here’s a great video that a mom shared about teaching her daughter oral blending. If you aren’t in the group already, you can request to join, and we’ll get you approved.

Another thing that you can do with young kids that’s fun: (First, the parent demonstrates this, and then the child mimics.) Lay three sheets of colored paper on the floor. Write one letter on each sheet of paper, like M – A – P. Jump on the first paper and say /mmmmm/. Jump on the second paper and say /ăăăăă/. Jump on the third paper and say /p/. Then start over, and do it quicker: /mmmmăăăă/-/p/, and then /mmmmmmăăăăăp/. Finally, run across the papers and say “MAP!” You can do a similar activity on the table with a race car and letters written on index cards.

You can also play oral segmenting games–say a word that has 2 or 3 sounds, and see if she can say the sounds in that word. Here’s a video that demonstrates how to segment sounds. (This post also talks about spelling, but don’t work on that yet–just segmenting words orally.)

Another game I used to play with my kids–I would pull down 3 letter tiles such as c, t, and a. I would draw 3 blanks on the board and say, “I want to make the word cat. What’s the first sound in cat?” (/k/) “Right! Which letter should I put first?” (see if he puts the C in the blank, or help her do that). “Good! What’s the second sound in cat? /kăăăăt/” (/ăăă/) and so on. See if she can help you make the 3-sound word, and then model how to sound it out and read it using the full blending procedure.

I hope this helps, but let me know if you have questions or need more ideas. I’m happy to help!

Sarah H.

says:

I am an adoring fan of both the AAR and AAS programs. I especially love all of the bonus activities/materials that they offer throughout the year via email. I highly recommend these programs make their way into your homeschool curriculum for reading and spelling success!

Robin

says: Customer Service

Thank you, Sarah! Great to hear that AAR and AAS are working so well for you!

Karen Eads

says:

I love the freebies on All About Learning Press. I am using All About Spelling for my 6-year-old whom I homeschool and his spelling has greatly improved.

Robin

says: Customer Service

Karen,
I’m so glad to hear that All About Spelling is working so well for your child!

Brittany

says:

The map vs. pan cartoon could not be more accurate – I feel seen and understood :) Going to try the cumulative blending procedure. Your team is the absolute BEST at offering support and I feel like everyone is truly there to help support me in teaching my child to read. THANK YOU.

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

I know what you mean, Brittany! More than one of my kids did the “/mmmm/-/aaaa/-/p/, pan!” thing. Sigh.

Thank you for your kind words. It’s important to all of us to be able to provide excellent support and it’s wonderful to hear we have succeeded.

Sara

says:

I tutor using AAR. The 8 year old I tutor didn’t know letter sounds, so we went back to level 1. He guesses at words he doesn’t know, or thinks he knows. Once that gets in his head he can’t shake said word and will often see the last letter first and then thinks it’s the first sound. When we work on blending, touching each sound or pulling a chip down for each sound doesn’t work. He gets frustrated and hates doing it. So our attempts to blend always fail. If I have him wrote the letter and say the sound, he does so carelessly. If I make him do it again, his attitude gets worse and he becomes frustrated and then shuts down and all learning comes to a halt.
I want to meet him where he’s at, and want him to blend the the sounds, but I’m unsure how to approach when the student is reluctant to participate and struggling with how to blend.

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

I’m so sorry your student is having such difficulties, Sara!

Are you using letter tiles? If you are not, then use letter magnets, letters printed on slips of paper, or something so you can manipulate one phonogram at a time.

Then, use the letter tiles (or whatever) for him to read reads. Place just one tile at a time in front of him. If he struggled with the word “catch”, just place C in front of him first and have him say the sound. Then pull it away and place A and have it say that sound. Then place TCH and have him say that sound. Then place C and A and have him sound out “/k/-/ă/, /kă/.” Then add the TCH and have him sound out “/kă/-/ch/, /kăch/, catch.”

Do this for a few words, then try placing the full word of tiles in front of him. Walk him through the blending procedure as outlined in this blog post, touching the tile and saying the sound, then blending the first two and saying the next sound, then blending the entire word.

Once he has the full blending procedure down well and is sounding out words with the tiles with some ease, then go back to reading words on cards or fluency practice sheets. But anytime he has difficulty with a word, go back to the tiles.

Also, how many times a week do you see this student for tutoring?

When Marie Rippel, the author and creator of All About Reading and All About Spelling, did tutoring, she only guaranteed results if the student came 3 days a week, or if the parents agreed to work with the student for 15 to 20 minutes a day 4 days a week in addition to the once a week tutoring. If parents were willing to do so, she spent the last 5 minutes or so of the tutoring session telling the parent what they needed to work on for the week.

If you are seeing this child less than 3 times a week and he is not getting review and practice at home, his struggles could be related to simply too much time without review. Ideally, a struggling student should have focused work for 20 or 30 minutes a day, 5 days a week.

I hope this helps some. I would like to help you further if you would want that. Are you using All About Reading with this student? If not, what are using? Does he have a diagnosed learning disability? How often do you see him and for how long?

Sara

says:

Great advice, I love that idea!

We use the letter tiles app, but I’ll switch it up to the actual tiles.

I see him twice a week for 30 min, his parents do review with him at home, but I don’t believe it’s everyday. I provide them with materials and things they can do to reinforce what was learned in the lesson. I might need to get stricter with them on that.
He does have adhd, and from what I can tell, a bad experience in school with some teachers, which doesn’t help his negative attitude when it gets hard and he gets frustrated.

Lauren

says:

My daughter can say all the sounds but she doesn’t hold them and blend into the next sound, which I can see will be a problem with bigger words. Should I keep stopping her and making her “blend” the sounds or just leave it if she is getting the words correct and she will eventually stop doing the choppy sounding out?

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

Lauren,
Is she able to easily read the words correctly without help or hesitation? If so, then she probably is able to “hear” the blend of sounds in her head. Some can.

As long as she is easily sounding words out, I wouldn’t worry too much about perfectly smooth blending. However, I recommend modeling it for her at least a few times a week. There may come a time when she needs to do it, so hearing you do it occasionally will help.

Holly C.

says:

My 8-yr-old grandson hates to be interrupted while he’s reading (don’t we all?) to sound out a word. I give him the word so we can move on, but note either the word or the concept so we can practice it separately during that part of our next lesson (yes AAR!)

Ashley

says:

My youngest still uses the colored tabs to sound out words even though he’s in AAS level 2. Learning how to sound out words has always been a struggle for him but having the right tools to fall back on always makes it achievable even with advancing words.

Ashley M

says:

I used this program with my son with no problems. He picked up on concepts super easily and is quite gifted in reading. However, we recently found out my daughter has dyslexia. I was excited because I already had the best program out there for helping young readers with dyslexia!! We went to do the first lesson and she is doing EXACTLY what the little comic shows in this blog post… I am so thankful I found it. I kind of skipped over the cumulative aspect of blending, so we will continue plugging away at lesson 1 until she has that mastered. Are there places I can find more practice words for her to use in blending? Or just the ones in the book?

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

I’m glad this blog post was so helpful for you, Ashley. That comic looks very familiar to many teaching younger learners!

Go ahead with lessons 2 and 3 while still working on lesson 1. That will give you a lot more words to work with, plus some new material to keep things fresh.

If you spend more than a week maybe two on these three lessons (spending about 20 minutes a day on reading) and your daughter is still having difficulties, please email us at support@allaboutlearningpress.com. We have some additional helps, tips, ideas, and suggestions to get your student over this difficulty.

Consider practicing phonological awareness skills as you work in lessons 1 through 3. Students that struggle with phonological awareness often struggle with blending sounds into words. If the activities on the phonological awareness skills are difficult for her, she may not be ready for Level 1.

Carley

says:

We are on lesson 7 of AAR 1 with my 6 year old. He is still sounding out almost every word. I have been doing fun games with the word cards, but nothing seems to stick. Do you have any suggestions?

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

Carley,
It sounds like your child is doing well. As long as he can sound out words without difficulty or help, he is doing well and can move forward. Reaching the goal of fluent reading will be a gradual process over many lessons. Some kids really need a lot of extra practice in the decoding stage, so spend as much time as needed and try not to worry if your student isn’t reading fluently just yet.

Students may need to read a word thirty times ore more before they can read it fluently without having to sound it out! So, just know that some beginning readers do need a lot of practice and review. Here’s an article on How to Develop Reading Fluency that can help you understand the overall scope of achieving fluency.

Some ideas that can help your child move to more fluency:

The Change-the-Word activities are especially helpful for working on blending and paying attention to all sounds in a word. Change one letter at a time, starting with simple 3-sound words like: bat-sat-sit-sip-tip-top…and so on. The Teacher’s Manual schedules these occasionally, but you can play this daily if your child doesn’t mind and you find it helpful. This activity is also especially helpful for working on consonant blends when you get to those lessons (Lesson 24 through 27).

The Word Cards allow you to track what has been mastered and what still needs work. Keep word cards in daily review until your student can read them easily, without needing to sound them out. Here are some fun review ideas for word cards. The Word cards will stack up as you go, so just rotate through a portion for 2-3 minutes each day and then pick up in the book wherever you left off previously. Shuffle the cards occasionally so they are not all in order. That way the student truly gets decoding practice and doesn’t just guess or memorize them in order. And here’s a fun little video explaining what to do when the cards stack up.

The fluency practice pages can be re-used as well. You might enjoy our 16 Ways to Make Practice Sheets Fun. (And check out the comments as well–lots of fun suggestions in there!)

Students who struggle with fluency will also benefit from rereading the same story two or three days in a row to gain fluency and confidence. Buddy Reading can be very powerful in helping students who are in this stage of struggling with fluency.

Rereading the stories will help accomplish these goals:

– Increase word rate
– Improve prosody. Prosody is “expressive reading.” It involves phrasing (grouping words into meaningful phrases), emphasis, and intonation (raising pitch at the end of questions, lowering pitch at the end of sentences)
– Improve automaticity (be able to recognize most words automatically without having to sound them out each time)

Here’s more help with Overcoming Obstacles when Reading AAR Stories.

You can also do a variation of buddy reading called “echo reading.” You read a few sentences with full expression, and then your child reads the same sentences, matching your expression as close as possible. Do this for approximately five minutes a day, or whatever is a comfortable length of time for your child. Add in lots of praise when your child shows even a bit of improvement.

The “Fun with Emojis” article gives an enjoyable way to work on reading with expression too. This can be a great way to make reading fun that also sneaks in some extra practice from the fluency pages or readers. Check out Reading with Expression for this activity and others.

I hope this helps, but please let me know if you have additional concerns or other questions.

eileen morse

says:

Excellent material to share with parents of budding readers! Thank you.

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

You’re welcome, Eileen!

Byron

says:

Do you have online classes teaching children to read?

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

Byron,
No. All About Learning Press offers Easy to Teach materials for parents and teachers to use with children. We do not offer classes.

Donald Knight

says:

Practical, structured and explicit.

Shelby Cleland

says:

Recently switched to AAR because my daughter and I needed a better more structured approach to learning to read and me teaching her to read. I love that this curriculum focuses sooo much on phonemic awareness and really nails down the concepts that are being taught rather than skimming through them like our last curriculum.
As I was prepping the material, I was saying to myself this looks like so much fun! My daughter is going to love all the “games”!!

Merry

says: Customer Service

I hope she does, Shelby! Let us know if you have any questions along the way. :-)

Beth

says:

Great tips!

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

Thanks, Beth!

Rebecca K

says:

I bought level 1 a year ago and my son was overwhelmed. But a year later we are able to get through half a lesson or the whole thing! I think it’s important to remember a kid may not be ready until they are closer to age 7 to read

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

I’m pleased to hear that your son is doing well with level 1 now, Rebecca.

Marinella

says:

My child loves this program and I can finally see improvements!!So thankful for AAR!

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

I’m so pleased to hear that your child is enjoying and improving in reading with All About Reading! Thanks for sharing, Marinella!

Missi

says:

Love blending. But the reason behind it is remarkable. I never knew how much is going on in little brains to figure out one word!

steven

says:

love

gayzel

says:

wonderful post. ❤️

Heather

says:

I love the concepts behind these programs. My son is such a successful reader because of them.

Natalie S.

says:

Thank you for this blog post and free resources. I love how you’ve broken down blending strategies into even more simple steps. Looking forward to tomorrow, when I can apply what I‘ve learned in my work with beginning readers!

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

You are so welcome, Natalie! I hope this worked well with your beginning readers.

Katharine Gindin

says:

This is explained so well!

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

Thank you, Katharine!

Steph

says:

I used cumulative blending for the first time with a student when I got this program. I was shocked! He was blending CVC words quicker and challenged himself to blend harder CCVC words. Definitely use this with all my students now

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

Thank you for sharing this, Steph! The cumulative blending technique is a great help for many students.

Amanda

says:

I have loved what all about reading has done for the children I’ve taught!

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

Thank you, Amanda!