If you’ve ever used the terms “sight words” and “high-frequency words” like they mean the same thing, you’re in good company. Most teachers do. I did too. It wasn’t until someone sat down and explained the actual difference that I realized the mistake I’d been making, and immediately understood why some of my students weren’t…
Every time I scroll through teacher Facebook groups or sit in a PD session, I hear the same thing: “We’re doing the science of reading now.” And almost always, what that means in practice is: “We switched to a new phonics program.” I get it. Phonics has been the loudest part of this conversation, and…
When I see a product labeled “Science of Reading aligned,” my alarm bells go off. I know that sounds strong. But after looking into countless programs, activity sets, phonics tools, and readers that carry that label, I’ve learned it doesn’t always mean what you think it means. It’s trending, and everybody is slapping that label…
Here’s something most teachers find surprising: the letter Y acts as a vowel in over 1,000 words in English. It only acts as a consonant in 57. That’s not a typo. Most of us grew up hearing “A, E, I, O, U, and sometimes Y.” The truth is, it should be “A, E, I, O,…
You’ve probably said it a hundred times: “Q always needs a U.” And it’s true. But if that’s where the lesson ends, your students are memorizing a fact without understanding a function, and that gap matters more than most phonics programs will tell you. Here’s the complete version of the rule: The letters Q and…
Picture this: You teach the Magic E rule. You explain it clearly. You put it on the word wall. You do the activity. Students chant it back to you.Then you hand them a decodable text, and they read “cape” as “cap. Sound familiar? This moment – the one where a student can recite a rule…
Your students already know that SH spells /sh/. That part is solid. They read ship and fish without any trouble. But here’s the question worth asking: do they know where SH spells /sh/? And do they know what spells /sh/ when SH isn’t the spelling? Because /sh/ is one of those sounds that gets spelled…
Here’s something that trips up a lot of students – and honestly, a lot of teachers too. The /z/ sound can be spelled two different ways: with Z or with S. And both are correct. The key is knowing when to use which one. This is one of those phonics rules that seems almost too…
If you’ve ever felt frustrated watching students guess at heart words during reading, spell said as “sed,” or struggle with the same irregular words week after week, you’re not alone. For years, I assessed heart words the same way most teachers do: flash cards. A student either read the word correctly or they didn’t. If…