Languagelab 2.4

Master Blending

IntroductionRecall that phonemes are the smallest

sound units in a word. The simplest word in English has one

phoneme and one syllable: I & A

I like you. A dog is barking.

Some of the simplest words have three phonemes: cat, sun, pan, fan, hot.

Auditory SkillsThe speed and accuracy - how fast and

how well – in which you convert sounds to letters or spell is determined by your Auditory Skills.

Like any skill, you need focus and practice.

Over time, it becomes automatic as you can read quickly and accurately without much thinking.

Basic Auditory SkillsWe started with the easy letter sounds

first. For all the vowels in our exercises , we used Short Monophthongs as our practice:

/a/ as in 'ant' /e/ as in 'bed' /i/ as in 'tin'/o/ as in 'frog'/u/ as in 'bus' d

SegmentingLet's take these words and segment them,

splitting them into its phonemes: cat = /c/ , /a/ , /t/ sun = /s/ , /u/ , /n/ pan = /p/ , /a/ , /n/ fan = /f/ , /a/ , /n/ hot = /h/ , /o/ , /t/These words are easy as they don't have

any digraphs, trigraphs, blends, silent 'e' or r-controlled sounds.

BlendingWe can also take the phonemes and blend

them, combining them into words: /c/ , /a/ , /t/ = cat /s/ , /u/ , /n/ = sun /p/ , /a/ , /n/ = pan /f/ , /a/ , /n/ = fan /h/ , /o/ , /t/ = hot Blending and segementing are direct

opposites.

Auditory SegmentingWe can split any word into its phonemes,

digraphs, trigraphs and blends, bearing in mind silent e and r-controlled phonemes.

pot = /p/ , /o/ , /t/ coke = /c/ , /o/ , /ke/ (Silent e) catch = /c/ , /a/ , /tch/ (Trigraph) hammer = /h/ , /a/ , /mm/ , /er/ (digraph & r-

control) shark = /sh/ , /ar/ , /k/ (digraph)Segmenting is advanced auditory skill.

Auditory BlendingBlending is the opposite of Segmenting. Blending is what we do when we spell. /p/ + /a/ + /n/ + /d/ + /a/ = panda /wr/ + /i/ + /s/ + /t/ = wrist /b/ + /r/ + /i/ + /dge/ = bridge /c/ + /o/ + /ff/ + /ee/ = coffee /l/ , /i/ , /ar/ = liar

Blending and SegmentingBlending and segmenting come after what

you have learnt earlier. Combined with the rest of the skills, it helps

you become a faster and better reader and speller!

Learning ActivityA score card is given for these advanced

auditory exercises. Refer to Page 41 of your LG.

Follow the instructions on the score card for training and practice.

Intensity Complexity (More focus) (More difficult)

Learning MilestonesWhat is Auditory Segmenting? What is Auditory Blending?What are the basic skills we must have

before we learn these two advanced skills?

Learning Milestones CheckAuditory Blending is the combining of

letter sounds into wordsAuditory Segmenting is the separation of

words into letter soundsBoth are built on our phonemic awareness

and phonological knowledge

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