Lesson 15

Long U sounds : ue u_e u ui ew

Greek Sounds : ph=f ch=k

Silent letters : kn wr gn mb mn

LEARNING WITH PHONICS - LESSON 15 VIDEO

MONA'S QUICK GUIDE

My whole programme is DEcoding, but on this one page, for a change, I am giving you different ways to spell one sound, ENcoding. Encoding synthetic phonics programmes such as Letters and Sounds have no rules except toward the end. DEcoding programmes such as mine have rules as you go along!

Long U sounds

There ARE no rules (that I know of) for ui and ew, so putting them beside the other already-learned (by rules) spellings for the long u sound makes a change. There are 5 different ways to make the long u sound :

  • ue: blue glue tissue

  • u_e: cube tube student

  • u: music usual humid

    • ui: suit fruit juice

    • ew: few stew grew

Greek sounds (ph ch)

Our language is enriched by contributions from other languages – French, German, Latin, Greek, Arabic, Urdu!

From Greek we have:

ph (= f) dolphin elephant.

ch (=k) echo school.

Silent letters

Some letters are silent k before n, and w before r at the beginning of words: know knock wrong wrap.

b and n are silent, as in –mb and –mn: comb lamb hymn autumn, but sounded in longer words: autumnal.

Silent h,g at the beginning of words: hour honest gnash gnome.

In “sign” the g is silent, but with a suffix it is sounded: signal signature.

ADDITIONAL NOTES

GAMES AND WORKSHEETS

Links will take you to a quick-view page in Google Docs where you may download the PDF for local printing by clicking File then Download original. This guide contains download and print tips.

Long U

ph ch

Silent letters