The document provides guidance for teachers on segmenting and blending words during phonics instruction. It outlines 9 activities for students to practice segmenting words into sounds and blending sounds to form words. The activities use methods like Elkonin boxes, jumping on letters, matching sounds to pictures, wearing sound necklaces, rolling phonics cubes, and baseball-style blending games to reinforce students' understanding of segmenting and blending skills. Teachers are advised to start with segmenting practice and provide blending instruction after to help students read words.

1. Segmenting and Blending Notes for Teachers
The second stage/phase of teaching phonics is to teach students to segment and blend
words.
Segmenting
 Segmenting means breaking the words up into their component sounds. For
example, the word ‘blue’ has three sounds /b/, /l/ and /u:/. The two letters ue are
one sound. The word cat also has three sounds /k/ /æ/ and /t/. The word shop also
has three sounds /ʃ/, /ɒ/ and /p/. The letters sh are one sound.
 Students need to learn to look at a word and immediately know exactly how many
sounds there are in that word and what those sounds are (segmenting).
 Students can do this only when they know the sounds well.
 Students must be guided by the teacher and the teacher must know which sounds
the students know and which they do not know. For example, the word blue
contains the sound /u:/ which is not taught to year 1 students. Therefore, year 1
students cannot segment the word blue and so in year 1 blue is a sight word.
 In the beginning the teacher guides the students by helping them to segment. The
teacher might start out by segmenting words for the students, while doing the action
for each sound. The teacher might progress to saying the word very slowly and
exaggerating or elongating the sounds while doing the actions. The teacher may
then say the word normally but tell students how many sounds there are in the
word.
 Ultimately, through whatever means necessary, the students should be able to hear
a word spoken normally and know exactly how many sounds in the word and what
those sounds are.
Blending
 Blending is when students combine (blend) sounds together in a logical way to read
a word.
 Students must be taught exactly how to blend sounds, that is, they must be taught
steps.
 Students must learn that when blending sounds it is necessary to group certain
sounds together is stages so that the blended sounds begin to sound like the word.
 Therefore, students must learn which sounds go together.
 For example, the word cat can be read two ways
1. c + a = ca. 2. a + t = at
ca + t = cat c + at = cat
1

2. SEGMENTING AND BLENDING ACTIVITIES
Activity 1 - Elkonin boxes
Aim: Students begin to learn to see and hear how many sounds there are in words.
Aim: Students understanding that some sounds have more than one letter is reinforced.
 Teacher gives students laminated Elkonin boxes, a whiteboard marker and a small
sponge.
 Mentor will say the word and will exaggerate the sounds of each letter and say the
word slowly.
 Students use a dry wipe marker to write the three sounds they hear.
 Teacher checks and gives feedback if students have written the wrong sound.
 Students rub out the writing with the sponge.
Progression to blending
Teacher can then drill the correct sequence of blending the sounds with the children.
Pictures of the words can be used as support or reinforcement.
Activity 2 – Jump on the Sound
Aim: to practise segmenting to identify initial, middle and final sounds in CVC words.
 Students are divided into teams of 4/5 students.
 Groups of students come to the front of the room. The teacher lays the large letter
cards on the floor. If there are 5 students in the group the teacher will lay down 4
cards of each letter.
 For extra support for beginning students the teacher can show students the gapped
word flashcards as a prompt. The teacher will then say the word and tell the
students to jump on the letter (on the floor) for the missing sound.
 Over time the teacher should reduce the support given to students and should ponly
say the word normally.
 The game continues until one student is the winner.
Progression to blending
Teacher can then drill the correct sequence of blending the sounds with the children.
Pictures of the words can be used as support or reinforcement.
Activity 3 – Which Sounds?
Aim: Students begin to learn to see how many sounds there are in words.
2

3. Aim: Students understanding that some sounds have more than one letter is reinforced.
Aim: To practise segmenting and identifying initial, middle and final sounds in CVC words.
 Teacher says some simple CVC words slowly while exaggerating the sounds.
 Pairs or individual students use their small letter cards to set out the sounds they
hear.
Progression to blending
Teacher can then drill the correct sequence of blending the sounds with the children.
Pictures of the words can be used as support or reinforcement.
Activity 4 – Which Sounds? Variation
Aim: Students begin to learn to see and hear how many sounds there are in words.
Aim: Students understanding that some sounds have more than one letter is reinforced.
Aim: To practise identifying sounds and letters
Aim: To practise blending sounds to form words.
Teacher places flash cards on the board which show pictures of things the children’s
letters. For example, if the children have small letter cards with c, a, t, and p. These
sounds can spell cat and tap so the teacher puts pictures of a cat and a tap on the board.
 Teacher says three sounds slowly while exaggerating the sounds. For example,
teacher says /k/ /æ/ and /t/.
 Pairs of students use their small letter cards to set out the sounds they hear.
Progression to blending
 Students then blend the three sounds to form a word. Students point to the picture
for that word.
 Alternatively, give the students small pictures which they have to match with the
word.
Activity 5 – Phonics Necklaces
Aim: To practise segmenting the sounds in words and arranging letters in the order they
were heard.
 Children are given sound necklaces to wear.
 Teacher says a word and the children wearing the sounds in that word have to find
each other and arrange themselves in order.
Progression to blending
Teacher then walks students through the blending process by getting students to blend the
sounds together as necessary.
3

4. Activity 6 – Phonics Cubes.
Aim: To practise segmenting and then blending three sounds (CVC).
 Groups of 3 students come to the front of the room.
 Each student takes a giant cube and rolls the cube. Individually the students have
to make the sound and do the action for the letter that is face up.
Progression to blending
Next, as a group the students have to blend the three sounds together to make a word.
The students have to say if this is a real word or a nonsense word.
As a prompt you can have pictures of the possible words on the board.
Activity 7 – If you think you know the word shout it out
Aim: To practise hearing sounds and blending them together to form words.
Teach the students the song below to the tune “if you’re happy and you know it clap your
hands”
If you think you know this word, shout it out!
If you think you know this word, shout it out!
If you think you know this word,
Then tell me what you've heard,
If you think you know this word, shout it out!
After singing, the teacher says a segmented word such as /t/ /æ/ /p/ and students provide
the blended word "tap."
Activity 8 – Baseball Blending
Aim: To practise hearing sounds and blending them together to form words.
 Divide the class into two teams.
 Say aloud a word phoneme by phoneme, or example, /p/ /æ/ /n/. If the child that
is “up at bat” can blend the word, he or she advances to first base.
 The next batter comes up, and the game continues just like baseball.
Activity 9 – Flip Books
Aim: To practise hearing sounds and blending them together to form words.
 Each student is given a flip book.
 The teacher calls out three sounds such as /p/ /æ/ /n/.
 Students find the sounds for that word.
 Students blend the sounds to read the word.
4