Word Study:

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Word Study Decoding Multi-syllabic Words
and Expanding Student Vocabularies
Bethany Robinson Reading First Regional
Coordinator bethanyr_at_esd105.wednet.edu (509)
952-2902
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Facility with big words is essential for students
as they read, write, and learn in all areas of
school and life. Many big words occur
infrequently, but when they do occur they carry a
lot of the meaning and content of what is being
read. --Cunningham, 1998
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Sample sentences from typical 2nd grade text

• Sacalos con una cuchara de agujeros y colocalos
  en una bandeja de hornear ligeramente engrasada.
• Lectura Bagels de jalapenos
• De repente, un dinosaurio de peluche entró
  volando por la ranura de la puerta por donde se
  devuelven los libros de la biblioteca.
  
• Foro Abierto Tomas y la senora de la biblioteca
• La vieja Juana cosechaba las calabazas más
  grandes, redondas y anaranjadas en toda la
  provincia de San Miguel.
• Trofeos Fiesta de Calabazas

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What are characteristics of your students who
struggle reading long words?

• They guess based on the first few letters.
• They may use context to guess.
• They often leave off endings.
• They take a long time to figure out words.

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Practice Activity

• Simulate the experience of reading as a 80, 90,
  97, and 100 accurate reader.
• How accurate did you need to be to truly make
  meaning from the text?

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Importance of Accurate Reading

• To fully understand text, students need to have
  an established level of knowledge for most, but
  not all of the words they read.

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Research Indicates Reading with 97 100
Accuracy Independent Reading Level 90 96
Accuracy Instructional Reading Level lt 90
Accuracy Frustrational Level
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Five Focus Areas in Reading First

• Phonological awareness
• Phonics/Decoding
• Fluency
• Vocabulary
• Comprehension

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Spanish Phonics Skills

• Single Sound Letter Correspondences
• Sounds Represented by More Than 1 Letter (que)
• Consonant Blends (triste)
• Consonant Clusters (algo)
• Digraphs (ch)
• Hard and Soft Sounds
• Inflectional Endings
• Homonyms (abrazar, abrasar)
• Dieresis
• Accents (aguda, grave, esdrujula)
• Compound Words
• Multi-syllabic Decoding
• Diphthongs (ay, ia)
• Compound Words
• Prefixes and Suffixes

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Skillful readers ability to read long words
depends on their ability to break the words into
syllables. This is true for familiar and
unfamiliar words. --Adams, 1990
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Palabras Compuestas

• One way to help children become confident reading
  longer words is to practice reading compound
  words.
• Orally blend compound words
• Orally segment compound words
• Orally omit words within the compound word
• Build real and silly compound words
• Break compound words into their two parts
• Read compound words (template 11 modified)
• Learn compound word meanings

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Syllable Types
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Model
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Practice

• amor
• foca
• jard?n
• hacer
• este
• tenemos
• evento
• último

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Combinaciones de consonantes
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Model
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Practice

• abrazar
• desastre
• explican
• secreto
• África

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Vowel Types
Diptongos Dos vocales en la misma s?laba
Hiatus - Dos vocales en s?labas diferentes
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Syllable Types
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Model
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Practice

• ca?do
• tuerce
• maestro
• pausa
• paraguas
• leopardo
• audiencia

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Practice transformar abstracto
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Syllable Types
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• For some children, their phonic skills break
  down when confronted by multisyllabic words
  because they cannot readily identify syllable
  boundaries.
• -- Eldredge, 1995

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How do we help students understand and use
syllable boundries?

• Teach them to read open and closed syllables in
  isolation. (Template 8)
• Teach them to chunk and blend syllables to read
  multi-syllablic words. (Templates 11 10)
• Teach students about strong and weak vowels
  forming diphthongs.
• Teach students the syllable types (v/cv, vc/cv,
  vcccv)
• Have students practice labeling and breaking
  words into syllables.

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• Partner Talk
• How does this information impact you as a
  teacher?
• How will you incorporate the activities mentioned
  into your instructional day?

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Syllable Boards

• Syllable boards can be made with laminate boards
  cut into index size cards OR laminated index
  cards.
• Syllable boards work with dry erase or vis-à-vis
  markers, making flexing the syllables easy for
  the student.
• Ask these questions
• Cuántas vocales hay?
• Son juntas o seperadas?
• If the vowels are together Son fuertes las dos
  vocales juntas?
• Tell the student to break the word into syllables
  using syllable boards.

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Teaching the word incomprensible

• Show the student the word.
• Ask Cuántas vocales hay? (5)
• Ask Son juntas o seperadas? (seperados)
• Have the student put down the number of syllable
  boards that represent of syllables. (5)
• If they put down any number other than five, ask
  them to count the vowels again.
• Students write one vowel on each board.
• Students flex the consonants around the vowels.
• Teacher guides student to correct syllables with
  questions and suggestions.
• Ask the student to read each syllable, out of
  order.
• Students read each syllable individually, then
  blend the syllables into a word.

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Teaching the word empleado

• Show the student the word.
• Ask Cuántas vocales hay? (4)
• Ask Son juntas o seperadas? (los dos)
• Ask Son fuertes las dos vocales juntas? (s?)
• Have the student put down the number of syllable
  boards that represent of syllables. (4)
• If they put down any number other than four, ask
  them to count the vowels again.
• Students write one vowel on each board.
• Students flex the consonants around the vowels.
• Teacher guides student to correct syllables with
  questions and suggestions.
• Ask the student to read each syllable, out of
  order.
• Students read each syllable individually, then
  blend the syllables into a word.

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Your turn -Teach your partner to read
emocionante

• Show the student the word.
• Ask Cuántas vocales hay? (6)
• Ask Son juntas o seperadas? (las dos)
• Ask Son fuertes las dos vocales juntas? (no)
• Have the student put down the number of syllable
  boards that represent of syllables. (5)
• If they put down any number other than five, ask
  them to count the vowels again.
• Students write one vowel or diphthong on each
  board.
• Students flex the consonants around the vowels.
• Teacher guides student to correct syllables with
  questions and suggestions.
• Ask the student to read each syllable, out of
  order.
• Students read each syllable individually, then
  blend the syllables into a word.

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Important Points Regarding Syllabication
Teach students to recognize common prefixes and
suffixes. contra decir cuent ista re accion
ario
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Word Attack Procedure
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Procedure for Word Attack
Practice presenting the instruction as detailed
on the Word Attack flow chart with a partner.
Choose one word from each column to work
with. aceptable rebajar desarma descorazo
nador incontable
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When students are decoding unknown multisyllabic
words, it is to their advantage to know prefixes
and suffixes. Such knowledge will also help in
learning the meaning of words. --Chall
Popp, 1996
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Transfer to English
Teaching students the most common prefixes is
beneficial because many prefixes are spelled the
same and have the same meaning in
English. Teaching students the most common
suffixes is beneficial because many suffixes have
similar spellings and meanings in English.
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Most frequent prefixes
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• Partner Talk
• How might you incorporate syllable boards and
  prefix / suffix word work into your instructional
  day?

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In order to read most multisyllabic words with
ease, students must be able to

• understand the concept of a syllable and how to
  identify vowels and consonants
• recognize the various syllable types and their
  pronunciations
• know where the syllables divide syllable
  patterns
• recognize common prefixes, suffixes, and base
  words
• possess the necessary mental flexibility to
  break a word and arrive at an approximate
  pronunciation, then use context to resolve
  ambiguity and confirm the word

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Pop Quiz

• Each of you has a question or an answer card.
• Find the person who has the matching question or
  answer and stand with them.

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Contact Information

• Bethany Robinson
• Reading First Regional Coordinator

bethanyr_at_esd105.wednet.edu [phone]
Thank you for coming to this session!