Purpose Uses of The Phonics Guide

When I was a literacy tutor for adults, I had wanted a go to phonics guide that I could easily refer to - to find out what the common letter patterns for any certain letter sound. I had wanted to know what all the different patterns were that I should cover for my students. My students that were advancing also started asking about particular letter patterns and in which cases did they applied. There wasn't any book like it around at the time, so I started writing it all down, alphabetically.

After I wrote it, I realized that it could be a resource book for literacy students as well as a reference book for tutors. Students could look up letter patterns and combinations, alphabetically, to help them review what they were learning. Tutors could look up common patterns to make sure that they covered them all in their lessons.

For both the tutor and the student, it serves as a reference guide, though it may be used differently by both.

For the tutor:
It serves as a teaching resource or reference guide. For instance; how many l blends are there and what are they. They can easily find this under the letter L. The same goes for R blends, etc.? Many teachers may already know this, but for a literacy tutor that did not have a teaching background, this could be a great help. I had started out as a Literacy Volunteer, and this type of training was not given.

For the student:
It serves as reinforcement, like a dictionary would. It is there as a resource for students not sure of a particular pattern; they can easily find it alphabetically. The illustrations will help to them jog their memory. They can also use the book to help them review. They can refer to a particular section, and create words and or sentences based on a particular blend, etc. They can also start to create new words, on their own, that aren't listed in the book.

This is a resource that can be used by both. The Phonics Guide: A guide to reading and spelling patterns. Check price on Amazon.

Cheryl Paton

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Letter Tile Ideas for Teaching Phonics

No matter the age of your student, it's fun to intermix playing games with other literacy activities.

Bananagrams is a spelling game featuring a banana shaped zippered pouch and Scrabble type alphabet letter tiles. It is easy and convenient to carry along.

The basic game is to place letter tiles face down and participants pick a number of tiles and they take turns adding to the crossword puzzle that they are making. The instructions will give more details and various options for ways to play the game.

With the letter tiles, you can also come up with your own variations. For instance, you could have your student practice making words that start with a certain blend, or make rhyming words that have the same spelling on the end of the word.

I am sure that you can come up with other ideas as well.

Some ideas are:

1. Scramble the letters of a particular word, say the word, then have the student rearrange the letters to spell the word correctly.

2. Lay a variety of letter tiles to choose from, then start the word with a letter blend, say the word, then have the student complete the spelling of the word.

3. Lay the letter tiles out to represent various blends, i.e. bl, cl, fl, etc. Say a word and have the student select the correct spelling for the beginning blend.

4. Lay the letter tiles out to represent various blends, i.e. br, cr, dr, etc. Place letter tiles in place to spell the remainder of a word. Have the student select the correct blend and have them place the correct tiles in front of the letters that make a word.

A small set is plenty enough tiles for a couple of people to play a variety of spelling games.

5. Make a crossword puzzle. Lay various letter tiles out, and spell a word with the tiles. Have the student think of a word that includes a letter that you have already used, and they can add their tiles to the crossword puzzle. Alternating turns, keep using letters that are already in the puzzle to be part of the new word.

As you can see, there are a variety of ways to use letter tiles to help reinforce learning.

If you don't already have letter tiles from an old Scrabble game, then I recommend Bananagrams; it comes with a storage bag to easily carry your letters and it's small enough to fit in a purse or backpack.


If you have other spelling ideas to use letter tiles, please share them with us below.

Cheryl Paton

Cheryl Paton is an Amazon affiliate and earns income from qualifying purchases made through links on this page. The above text links go to Amazon.

The writing on the doors, sheilas, gals, women

I used to tutor adults in literacy. One of my clients told me that at times he ended up in the women's restroom simply because he didn't recognize the word on the door.

I hadn't given much thought to that until he had mentioned it to me. Most restroom doors do seem to have a silhouette of some type to go along with the text on the door; but apparently not all establishments have done that.

If you see any restrooms that don't have a proper image to go along with their words, be sure to let the management know. Restrooms should be recognizable by all people, whether it is an adult literacy student or by someone from another country.

There are also restrooms that are meant for both men and women; they are usually referred to as family restrooms.

If you own or manage a business that needs an update on restroom signs, you can visit the previous text link to shop on Amazon.

And also, to the best of your ability, work with your students to recognize the various sight words for men and women that are used in your local area.

Cheryl Paton

Cheryl Paton earns income from qualifying purchases made through links on this page.

Consider teaching little words as syllables for the adult student

Most of my adult literacy students had not problem with learning "little" words. They saw it as a foundation for learning bigger words.

But one student in particular already knew a lot of sight words, and didn't make the connection of it being a building block. I think it would have helped if she had thought of them as syllables.

So that might be an approach if you are having a similar situation.

An idea may be to use some of the sight words that the student already knows, and break those down into syllables.

Then you can ask your student if they recognize any of them as being words by themselves; such as cat in the word category.

Cheryl Paton

Improve Literacy - Have your child dictate a story

When children first look at letters, it might look rather foreign to them. However, by writing down something that you child has said, and then read it back to them, makes a stronger connection.

A simple way to do this is to first show the child a picture and ask the child to tell you something about the picture. Then write down each word that the child says, and then read it back to them.

You can also read it again, pointing to each word as you read it.

If you have done a simple outline drawing for the picture, you can also have the child color it in. It helps them to identify with it more, and it also adds an element of fun.

Their early stories will probably be pretty short, maybe two to three words. As the child's vocabulary expands, they will begin to tell longer stories.

These stories can be easily made by adding a photo or drawing a picture on Blank Index Cards,, showing it to the child, and then writing down what they say.

Their stories can be read again and again. My daughter loved sitting down with me to read her stories.

The children's stories, whether short or long, can be placed in pages in mini photo albums. It keeps the pages safe and clean, and makes them more enjoyable to read.

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Cheryl Paton

Alphabet Posters for English

Alphabet posters for kids are a fun way to help reinforce learning of the alphabet. Kids can be attracted by the fun illustrations and colors, and/or they can add their own color on the coloring poster.

childrens alphabet poster

by joingateillustration

For added fun, the kids can color in this one:

Coloring Alphabet Chart to Color Poster

by Cherylsart

Some charts feature blends and digraphs for the more advanced learners.

Learning the alphabet is the basic foundation for learning to read and write. It's great that you're choosing fun ways to incorporate learning in fun ways.

The first two charts above can be ordered from Zazzle.com. The third chart is ready for purchase at Amazon.

If you want this kind of information that isn't shown in such a cute format, for your older students, then check out my book, The Phonics Guide. Common letter patterns, including blends and digraphs, are listed in alphabetical order in the book. The illustrations are simple black and white drawings without all of the cute.

Visit here for alphabet charts illustrated with direction arrows on the letters. You can choose from posters, notepads, and jigsaw puzzles.

Cheryl Paton

C. Paton was a literacy tutor for adults for twelve plus years and is the author of The Phonics Guide: A guide to reading and spelling patterns. Cheryl earns income from qualified purchases made through the links on this page.

What are some different ways of spelling the long sound of A?

There are several ways of spelling the long sound of A.

The letter A is a vowel. A by itself can be pronounced as long a, such as, I will go on a hike. The letter a is also a word. The only other letter that is also a vowel and a word, is the letter i.

AI
A common letter pattern for long a, is the letter a, followed by a consonant, followed by a silent e; such as cake, made, grapes, and mate.

The letter pattern AI is also another common spelling for long A; such as train, aim, paid, and grain.

The AI pattern is found in the middle of the syllable or single syllable word.

An exception for the sound is found in the word said, the AI pattern represents the sound of short E in the word said.

Keep in mind that when the AI pattern is immediately followed by the letter R, that the sound is R-controlled. The pattern AIR is also a word when used by itself. It also represents the same sound when used as part of other AIR words, as in hair and fair.

AY
AY is another long A pattern, as in lay, play, stay. and gray.

AY is used mainly at the end of the word or syllable. An exception to this is the word crayon where the A is actually at the end of the first syllable and the Y is the first letter of the next syllable.

EA
EA represents a variety of sounds, one of them is long A, as in break, steak, and great. The EA pattern for long A is found in the middle of the syllable.

EI
The letters EI also represent the sound of long A, as in vein, weigh, weight, and neighbor.

The EI pattern is found in the middle of the syllable

EY
EY can also represent the sound of long A, as in prey and they. EY also represents long E, as in the word, key.

The EY pattern for long A is found at the end of the word or syllable.

You can find this type of information, and more, in The Phonics Guide. If you have found this information helpful, or know someone who would, then you and/or they would probably benefit from reading The Phonics Guide: A guide to reading and spelling patterns. The text link will take you to Amazon where you can order it.

It is not a lesson book, but a reference book, guide, that one can refer to, to look up common spelling patterns, alphabetically.

Cheryl Paton

Cheryl Paton was a literacy tutor for over 12 years. She wrote The Phonics Guide based on the types of questions her adult literacy students were asking her. Cheryl receives income for qualifying items purchased through links on this page.