Spell words easier with lists of 4 grapheme types

Study Zone Institute May 9, 2023 Free Resources

Learning to spell red, head and said can be made easy when you know what is a phoneme and a grapheme. Phoneme is the smallest sound you hear in a word and grapheme is the letter or letters used to represent the phoneme in writing.

The graphemes e, ea and ai represent the same middle phoneme in red /r/-/e/-/d/, head /h/-/ea/-/d/ and said /s/-/ai/-/d/.

Phonemes that are represented by different graphemes can make learning to read or spell very difficult for some people. This is because spelling rules don’t apply to words that contain graphemes with more than one letter. When learning or teaching English, using grapheme lists can be very helpful as similarly spelled words are grouped together.

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It is important to know that a grapheme is arbitrary. It has absolutely no relation to the phoneme it represents. The symbols were designed by people in history due to creativity, invasions and migration.

In the English language, all words have at least one grapheme that represents a vowel sound. In the German language, some words have no vowel sounds and are represented by graphemes only consisting of consonants.

Graphemes fall under four types. Placing each grapheme under a different heading helps to make sense of the phoneme it represents. Here are four grapheme types to make spelling words easier.

4 Grapheme types to make spelling words easier

1. Single letter

A grapheme can be a single letter that represents a phoneme. There are 26 letters in the English alphabet that do this. These are written as capital or common letters: Aa, Bb, Cc, Dd, Ee, Ff, Gg, Hh, Ii, Jj, Kk, Ll, Mm, Nn, Oo, Pp, Qq, Rr, Ss, Tt, Uu, Vv, Ww, Xx, Yy and Zz.

The letters a, e, i, o, u and y represent long and short sounds. The letters b, c, d, g, j, k, l, v, w, x, y and all vowels represent hard sounds. Soft sounds are represented by f, h, p, and t. Nasals are represented by m and n. Sibilant sounds are written with an s and z.

2. Digraph

A digraph is a grapheme made by two letters that represent one sound. Some are ai, ea, ee, ei, ey, ew, ie, oa, oo, ou, ow, ch, sh, ss, th, wh and wr. Each grapheme that is a digraph may represent one or more phonemes. Listen to the different sounds made with the same grapheme in the following words:

ai – paid, said
aw – jaw, claw
ay – day, say
ea – bead, head
ee – feed, been
ei – vein, leisure
ey – obey, honey
ew – few, sew
ie – field, friend, believe
oa – boat, road
oo – took, food, door
ou – youth, soul, cousin
ow – know, tow
ch – chat, tech
ph – phone, graph
sh – ship
ss – passion
gh – rough, tough
th – thin, that
wh – white, whole
wr – write, wrong

3. Trigraph

A trigraph is a grapheme made by three letters that represent one sound. Some of these are air, are, ear, eir, eig, dge, ght, oar, oor, igh, ure and tch. Observe the single sounds made with the following trigraphs:

air – hair, pair, stair, flair
are – care, rare, dare, share
ear – bear, dear, fear, tear
eir – their, weird, weirdo
eig – reign, foreign, feign, sovereign
dge – edge, grudge, hedge, ledge
oar – boar, roar, soar, board
oor – door, floor, poor, moor
igh – sigh, highlight, sight
ure – cure, endure, mature, sure
tch – catch, fetch, switch, notch
gue – colleague, fatigue, league, vague

4. Grapheme with 4 letters

A grapheme with 4 letters represents one sound in a word. It is referred to as a ‘tetragraph‘ and ‘quadgraph’ by many teachers. Some of these are augh, eigh, ough, and ngue. Listen to the single sounds made with the following ‘tetragraphs’:

augh – caught, naught, daughter
eigh – eight, weigh, height
ough – through, although, though
ngue – tongue, cangue, gangue
heir – heirdom, heirloom

Conclusion

These are four grapheme types that can make spelling words easier. Lessons can be more fun as words that look the same and may or may not sound the same are placed into groups. This makes remembering the spelling of sight words easier rather than learning them in isolation.

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