What to Know When Teaching Phonics and Spelling: Phonemes and Graphemes
The English language has a complex history that has been influenced by many cultures and languages, which explains why it is so interesting and varied. Variations in spelling for many sounds can make both learning to spell, and teaching spelling, a challenge!
There are, however, specific rules and generalizations that teachers can highlight to help their students overcome these spelling challenges.
But first, I'd like to share some “pure” and simple background information about the sounds and letters that make up words.
Bonus: Download a FREE copy of 44 Phonemes of the English Language. This comprehensive, easy-to-read chart also includes the 200+ graphemes that represent those phonemes! But first, read on!
TABLE OF CONTENTS
There’s More to Know
What’s So “Pure” About It?
You may have noticed my last name is Pure. In addition to creatively weaving my name into this blog post, I wanted to emphasize that the definitions of pure as "without any extraneous and unnecessary elements" and "about increasing knowledge of a subject" make sense to use when describing the background information I'm sharing here.
The following is important knowledge to have when teaching spelling. It's not extra, and it can be simple!
What To Know First: Phonemes and Graphemes
Phoneme = the smallest unit of sound in a word
Phonemes cannot be written, so we use letters to represent the sounds in a word. There are 26 letters and *44+ sounds (phonemes) in English made up of consonants and vowels. *NOTE: Some variation exists due to accents and articulation of sounds. / / connotes “sound of”.
Example: "top" has 3 phonemes → /t/ /ŏ/ /p/
Grapheme = a unit of writing corresponding to a phoneme
A graph is a visual representation of information. A grapheme is a letter or group of letters that represent a sound. A grapheme is also sometimes referred to as a phonogram. There are different types of graphemes because sometimes the symbols for a sound can contain more than one letter.
| Graph | 1 letter = 1 phoneme | Example: t = /t/ |
| Digraph | 2 letters = 1 phoneme | Examples: sh = /sh/, ai = /ā/ |
| Trigraph | 3 letters = 1 phoneme | Example: igh = /ī/ |
| Quadgraph | 4 letters = 1 phoneme | Example: ough = /ō/ |
| Graph | 1 letter = 1 phoneme |
Example: t = /t/ |
| Digraph | 2 letters = 1 phoneme |
Examples: sh = /sh/ ai = /ā/ |
| Trigraph | 3 letters = 1 phoneme |
Example: igh = /ī/ |
| Quadgraph | 4 letters = 1 phoneme |
Example: ough = /ō/ |
One phoneme can be represented by more than one grapheme.
Example: /d/ can be spelled with 3 different graphemes.
d → dog
dd → add
ed → spelled
✢
One grapheme can represent more than one phoneme.
Example: ‘ch’ can represent 3 different phonemes.
chin → /ch/
machine → /sh/
chord → /k/
The 7-letter word “spelled” has:
5 phonemes → /s/ /p/, /ĕ/, /l/, /d/ and 5 graphemes → s p e ll ed
There’s More to Know
The English alphabet has 26 letters, 44+ phonemes (which includes 21 vowel sounds), and approximately 250 graphemes!
As of 2021, the estimated number of words currently in use in the English language (that contain entries in The Second Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary) is 171,476 words, all stemming from combinations of those 44+ phonemes and 200+ graphemes!
Teaching phonics and spelling does not start with teaching that there are many thousands of words to know. It starts with this fact — ALL words have at least one vowel, one phoneme, one grapheme, and one syllable.
This post focused on phonemes and graphemes and to keep it simple (as promised!), it will end here. But there is a lot more to know about vowel sounds and syllables!
Check out Part Two of this series — What To Know When Teaching Phonics and Spelling: Vowel Sounds and Syllables
Hands raised for helpful background information for
teaching phonics and spelling!
Bonus: Download a FREE copy of 44 Phonemes of the English Language. This comprehensive, easy-to-read chart also includes the 200+ graphemes that represent those phonemes!