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DIGRAPHS IN DEPTH

WEBINARwith Lyn Stone

© Lyn Stone 2020 all rights reserved

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PLEASE ALLOW ME TO INTRODUCE MYSELF

Linguist in private practice

Author of books and programs on spelling, grammar, reading and soon…writing

Consultant

Consumer

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I OFTEN GET ASKED TRICKY

QUESTIONS

“Why does the <a> say its name in change but not chance?”

“What’s the <b> doing in debt?”

“Should you teach split digraphs?”

“Are -ff, -ss, -ll digraphs?”

My answer is always the same…

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“WELL THAT DEPENDS…”

1. What else are you teaching?

2. Where did you start?

3. What’s your end point?

4. How will you know if your students have reached that?

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DO YOU HAVE A SYSTEM?

Every major public inquiry into the teaching of reading in the past three decades has concluded certain things about teaching reading:

§ Be systematic

§ Be explicit

§ Don’t be random

§ Teach the structure of written words

§ There are plenty of resources for this

§ If you feel you have to ask a random question about teaching a certain pattern, what are you really saying?

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DIGRAPHS

"two letters used to represent one sound"

Greek di- “twice” + -graph ”something written”

Also:

dichotomy

dilemma

dioxide

diphthong

biography

autograph

photograph

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AS OPPOSED TO DIAGRAPH

"instrument for drawing objects without the need for artistic skill,”

stencil-cutter, precursor to the 3D printer

dia- “through, in different directions, between” + -graph

Also:

diagram

diagonal

diameter

diarrhoea

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TPT HAS A LOT TO ANSWER FOR

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WHAT’S THE POINT OF DIGRAPHS ANYWAY?

The Roman alphabet wasn’t adequate

The Normans had their own way of doing things

The recombination of a limited set of symbols allows unlimited expression

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WHAT’S THE POINT OF WORD-FINAL E?

Mostly, it helps signal pronunciation and grammar.

can/cane, hop/hope, rag/rage, dense/dens

It also solves problems of standardization (illegal letters, syllables having vowel letters):

due, lie, live.

Does it form so-called ‘split digraphs’?

That depends on your system. Even the great John Walker of Sounds Write doubts it:

“Although I believe that we teach teachers how to cope with so-called split spellings very well indeed, and I believe that, in the main, our approach works well, I think that there may be a better, more credible alternative.”

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DIGRAPHS AND WORD-FINAL E ARE TWO DIFFERENT THINGSDIGRAPHS

th

sh

ch

oo

ea

ie

WORD-FINAL E

cane, Pete, pine, hope, cute

race, rage

due, live, lie

lapse

table, uncle, people

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a system for forming all the possible 2-letter vowels

2 letters/1 sound = digraph

THE VOWEL GENERATOR

A device used to produce something

GENERATOR DEFINITION:

a

e

i

o

u

+?

h

VOWEL COMBINATIONS

THE VOWEL GENERATOR

a e i o uaeiou

wr yX ae ai X au awar ayea ei X eu ewer eyX ie X X X Xir Xoa oe oi oo ou owor oyX ue ui X Xur uyX

ee

WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF I CONTINUE TO USE SPLIT DIGRAPHS?Not much

You could do a lot worse

If your system allows for that and your children are succeeding in spelling, well done.

If your system allows for that and you intend to give them more linguisticallyaccurate information up the track, even better.

From a clinical perspective, my population is utterly confused by this and continues to make word-final e errors in writing, because all the emphasis went on this split digraph concept with no follow-up.

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Stay in touch

Twitter• @lifelonglit

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Website• www.lifelongliteracy.com

Email• lynstone@lifelongliteracy.com

Newsletter• Language Fountain

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REFERENCES

John Walker’s blog on ‘split spellings’ –

https://theliteracyblog.com/2015/10/16/why-the-split-spelling-cracks-me-up/?fbclid=IwAR3xsRVUMnFgeW6OvYdsMVojiEGAeACv9zjbB0mvY4D40E2eHRPokFR2sZw

Spelling for Life scope and sequence

https://lifelongliteracy.com/shop/spelling-for-life-professional-development-workshops/

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