Vowel Sound Posters
Support for Any Phonemic Awareness Program
Readsters vowel sound posters help students identify and remember the vowel sounds and their labels.
Available in Two Formats
English is confusing to learn to read because we have many vowel sounds and most of them are spelled multiple ways. Since every spoken syllable has a vowel sound and most written syllables have a spelling for the vowel sound, there is no escaping the vowels.
For this reason, Readsters recommends explicitly teaching all students to hear and label the vowel sounds in spoken words. To do this we have divided the vowel sounds into four categories: short, long, r-controlled and other. We teach a motion based on a guide word and the specific label (short a, long o, etc.) for each of the short and long vowel sounds. For the r-controlled and other vowels students only learn the sound and the generic label ‘r-controlled’ or ‘other’.
Students then practice hearing the vowel sound in spoken words, identifying it while making the motion (if it is short or long), and then labeling it. They do this using a routine we call “stretching sounds” which involves saying the word, segmenting the word into sounds by stretching out a finger for each sound while saying it, and then re-blending the word while pulling fingers back into a fist. The stretching routine can also be used to blend sounds into words and identify the vowel sound and label.
We include this teaching in our Phonics Plug-In lessons, but, of course, it can be taught alone.
As an aid in teaching the vowel sounds and labels, we offer our vowel sound posters in two formats: the 4 categories on one large poster or a set of 4 smaller posters with each category on its own poster.
We are in the process of developing stand alone lessons for teaching the vowel sounds and labels. In the meantime, you can download a suggested scope and sequence, a list of the motions for short and long sounds (we don’t use motions for the r-controlled or other vowel sounds), and our Phonics Plug-in ONE scripts for practicing with segmenting and blending sounds by clicking here.
Available in Two Formats
The vowel sound posters are available in two formats:
