Unerstanding phonemes and graphemes

'Long A' investigation

Understanding how phonemes are represented in writing through different graphemes (teams of one, two or three letters) significantly helps children to make important decisions when spelling. It's fortunate that English has different ways to write the same phoneme. Through inquiry and investigation the children identified different ways to write the phoneme 'Long A'.

The children identified that a base with a final <e> can indicate that the previous vowel is 'Long', if there is a consonant(s) in between; like <crane>, <cake>, <made> or <ache>. This is one of the more common ways to write the 'Long A'.

The children went on a word hunt to discover other ways to write the 'Long A'.
As they identified words we sorted them on the phoneme chart and discovered  four other ways of writing the "Long A'
<ay> <ai> <ey> and <v + igh>

We looked for patterns to help us decide which grapheme to use when spelling.
We noticed interesting things like;

• <ay> was always in the final position, 
• <ai> was usually in the medial position, 
• only a few words used the digraph <ey> 
• and we only found two words for <v+ight>. 

Investigating, questioning, discussing and drawing conclusions ensures that children make informed decisions while spelling. It also demonstrates that spelling is a thinking activity not a memorisation activity. When children are actively involved in learning, deep understanding occurs.