Professional Documents
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This article introduces a strategy readers. In paring these down to a manageable num-
ber, he commented that some of the generalizations
for teaching systematic phonics
represented a clutter of “statements with no clear in-
with a logical system of grapheme– dication as to what was to be done” (p. 183). Of the
phoneme relationships. 150 generalizations, he chose 45 to evaluate against
2,600 words that he drew primarily from four widely
used basal readers. Among other parameters, in-
E
instein wrote, “The object of all science...is to cluding his requirement of finding at least 20 words
co-ordinate our experiences and to bring them from the word list to compare with each generaliza-
into a logical system” (as cited in Hawking, tion, he established the relative reliability for each
2007, p. 265). The National Reading Panel promoted generalization.
the idea of using a logical system for phonics by con- Simply put, from the word list Clymer (1963/1996)
cluding “that systematic phonics instruction produc- identified the ratio of the number of words that con-
es significant benefits for students in kindergarten formed to a generalization to the total number of
through 6th grade and for children having difficulty words that applied to it. Of the 45 phonic generaliza-
learning to read” (National Institute of Child Health tions, he identified only 18 that met 75% utility. For ex-
and Human Development, 2000, p. 9). The panel also ample, he found that the letter–sound patterns of kn
wrote, “The hallmark of a systematic phonics ap- in knife and ght in night showed high utility and that
proach or program is that a sequential set of phonics their corresponding generalizations reflected this
elements is delineated” (p. 8). utility. Contemporary reading and linguistic literature
For decades, reading researchers unsuccess- replaced the term utility with the term transparency,
fully sought to unveil a logical generalized system of as this article reflects.
delineated letter–sound elements. Johnston (2001) Furthermore, Clymer’s (1963/1996) research
echoed this by stating that phonic generalizations showed that the majority of the generalizations failed
still fail to offer a useful guide to phonics. In just five to meet the minimum standard that he set for letter–
transparent phonic generalizations, this article ties sound utility; within this article, for these and other
the strong recommendation of the National Reading phonic irregularities, we use the term unfit (Pei,
Panel for teaching systematic phonics with a logical 1966). Clymer’s research captivated the interest of
system of grapheme–phoneme relationships. other researchers, who replicated the study of the
same set of 45 generalizations. Comparing Clymer’s
study with five replications, Curry and Geis (1976) re-
Review of the Literature ported that, collectively, 20 of the 45 generalizations
Clymer (1963/1996) conducted the first major study met the minimum transparency of 75%.
of phonic rules, many dating back to their introduc- Three comprehensive vowel generalizations, writ-
tion by Noah Webster in late 18th-century editions of ten in assorted variations, created the most intense
his primer, affectionately remembered as “Webster’s interest: (1) A single vowel usually has its short sound
blue-backed spellers.” Clymer culled 150 phonic gen- in a closed syllable and its long sound in an open syl-
eralizations from “four widely used sets” of primary lable (e.g., sup/per vs. su/per); (2) when a word ends
The Reading Teacher, 64(5), pp. 330–339 © 2011 International Reading Association
330 DOI:10.1598/RT.64.5.3 ISSN: 0034-0561 print / 1936-2714 online
in a final single vowel-consonant-e, the first vowel has in kitchen, catch, and chair, not like sh. These, like a
its long sound, and the e is silent; and (3) when two number of other generalizations that Clymer found
vowels “go a-walking” the first one “does the talking.” in use, are clearly of limited utility because of their
As part of her phonic research, Burmeister (1968) narrow focus.
addressed the single-vowel sounds within the closed- From 1977 through 1988, Greif conducted at least
and open-syllable generalization. She used the same 11 grapheme–phoneme studies, all of which showed
word list that Hanna, Hanna, Hodges, and Rudorf undependable letter–sound relationships. From
(1966) used to conduct seminal phoneme–grapheme these studies he concluded that reading teachers
orthographic research for encoding. However, should largely abandon phonic instruction (Greif,
Burmeister studied grapheme–phoneme correspon- 1988). Although Clymer’s (1963/1996) study contin-
dence for decoding, the opposite process. Although ued to evoke interest, partly evidenced by its reprint-
she fell short of identifying the specific sounds of ing in 1996 in The Reading Teacher, the research into
the closed vowels, she found that a single vowel in phonic generalizations quieted (Johnston, 2001).
a closed syllable usually has a short or schwa sound. In summary, the generalizations that evolved
Unexpectedly, she also found the long vowel sound literally over centuries show little promise of recon-
in less than a third of the open-syllable single vow- ciliation with words found in children’s literature. To
els. Her research suggests that the letter–sound rela- bring the National Reading Panel’s support for sys-
tionships of open and closed single vowels are more tematic phonics instruction into alignment with a co-
alike than different. ordinated understanding of systematic letter–sound
Besides the fact that emergent readers struggle to relationships, the lead author designed the following
distinguish between the closed and open syllables, research.
research into this generalization showed uncertain-
ty. Burmeister’s (1968) seminal report and others’
subsequent research, including a report by Greif Revisiting Letter–Sound
(1981), presented a compelling case to abandon the
open- and closed-syllable generalization. In defer-
Relationships
ence to this strong indictment, the open- and closed- Rather than revisiting the degree of conformity of
syllable generalization persists in many early reading letter–sound relationships for existing generaliza-
programs. tions, the lead author approached the research as if
Researchers poured even more energy into trying all letter–sound patterns were unknown. He select-
to reconcile letter–sound patterns with the final sin- ed 16,928 words within the Zeno et al. (1995) word
gle vowel-consonant-e (-VCe; Burmeister, 1969; Greif, list. These words represented those that occurred at
1980) and the vowel digraph generalizations (Bailey, least once per million running words in children’s lit-
1968; Greif, 1983; Johnston, 2001). Despite numerous erature, excluding slang, dialectical, contracted, ab-
attempts, the research showed that, as traditionally breviated, or hyphenated words, and proper nouns.
stated, neither generalization approached a reason- From a computer analysis of these words, which in-
able transparent threshold. Thus, researchers strong- cluded all possible two-letter combinations as well as
ly caution against their use. many three-, four-, and five-letter patterns, emerged
As Calfee (1998) and Johnston (2001) noted, as stand-alone letters and letter clusters of cell patterns.
opposed to vowels, the consonants present greater The term cell, originally drawn from biology, means
letter–sound predictability and less challenge to the smallest unit capable of independent function-
emergent readers. Nonetheless, a deep understand- ing. The word thatch, for instance, includes three dis-
ing of the letter–sound interrelationships requires tinct phonic cells as heard in the phonemes /th/ /a/
an analysis of all of the letters, including the conso- /ch/. (For these phonemes and throughout this
nants. Clymer (1963/1996) and those who replicated article, the authors used the American Heritage
his study analyzed several consonant generalizations Dictionary as the pronunciation guide.)
that included the following: When c is followed by The study established a benchmark of no less
e or i, the sound of s is likely to be heard. When the than 75%, but sought at least 90% transparency for
letter c is followed by o or a, the sound of k is likely each cell. Additionally, if a reoccurrence of a particu-
to be heard. Also, ch is usually pronounced as it is lar phonic cell appeared in a target word, the study
332 The Reading Teacher Vol. 64, No. 5 February 2011
Table 1
Single Vowels; Exclude R-Controlled Vowels and the 3,054 Instances of the Unfit Single Vowel O
a e i u y
■ c at: 3,703/4,059 ■ en: 4,002/4,494
p ■ ig: 5,011/5,552
p ■ ug: 1,343/1,421
b ■ k itty: 1,304/1,321
(Include the short a (Include the short i (Include the schwa (Include the schwa ■ fly: 14/14 (one
sound in about and sound in pretty and sound in pupil.) sound in mucus.) syllable)
the syllabic l sound the schwa sound in ■ night: 101/101 ■ ruby: 440/509 (This ■ defy: 14/18
in pedal.) kettle.) u-consonant-vowel
■ ball: 51/52 (one- ■ edge: 308/318 pattern includes
syllable roots) (ends words, the u sounds in
■ nation: 341/349 except –VCe) numerous and
■ wa: 119 unfit words popular; it excludes
the prefixes un and
sub.)
Note. Bold and italics identify the phonic cell under consideration—nation. Italics only include a signal letter(s) that is not a part of the sound—
consider the letters by that signal the long u sound in ruby. This table includes 16,632/18,208 discrete transparent cells: 91% transparent.
Table 2
Final Vowel-Consonant-e (-VCe); Exclude R-Controlled -VRe
a-Consonant-e e-Consonant-e i-Consonant-e o-Consonant-e u-Consonant-e
■ c ake: 131/138 ■ gene: 22/23 ■ ike: 189/206
b ■ one: 112/127
b ■ use/dune: 75/79
■ face/palace: 23/24 ■ ice/office: 26/27 ■ handsome: 9/10
■ cage/cabbage: ■ massive: 32/32 ■ -ove: 15 unfit
61/62 ■ captive: 92/92 words
■ gate/chocolate: ■ -ile: 29 unfit words
134/134 ■ -ine: 66 unfit words
Note. Bold and italics identify the phonic cell under consideration—captive. A slash (/) shows distinct phonemes for a particular phonic cell—face/
palace. This table includes 906/954 discrete transparent cells: 95% transparent.
Table 3
Vowel Digraphs That Occurred 100 Times or More; Exclude R-Controlled Vowel Digraphs
and the 215 Instances of the Unfit IA Digraph
ai au ay ea ee ie
■ nail: 294/331 ■ auto: 108/120 ■ hay: 123/125 ■ t ea/head: ■ bee: 324/327 ■ c hief: 76/80
583/638 (excludes y to
(Include syllabic ie + suffix)
l as in real.) ■ pie: 12/12
(1 syllable)
■ diet: 15/18
■ ien: 74 unfit
words
io oa oi oo ou ow
■ io: 117 unfit ■ soap: 113/127 ■ oil: 113/127 ■ oon: 185/198
m ■ u: 80 unfit
o ■ ow/town:
m
words ■ foot: 17/17 words 213/216
■ mansion: ■ book: 42/43 ■ hound: 128/139
771/818 ■ ood: 61 unfit ■ famous: 47/48
words ■ house/louse:
32/32
Note. Bold and italics identify the phonic cell under consideration—bee. A slash (/) shows distinct phonemes for a particular phonic cell—tea/head.
This table includes 3,182/3,403 discrete transparent cells: 94% transparent.
b c d f g h j
■ b
ib: ■ c at: ■ d
ad: ■ f an: ■ g
ag: ■ hat: 693/736 ■ jug: 198/199
1,901/1,939 2,828/2,832 3,113/3,151 1,631/1,633 942/989
■ cent: ■ added/fixed: ■ gem:
37/37
■ musician:
12/12
■ precious:
13/13
k l m n p qu r
■ k
ick: ■ lip: ■ m
om: ■ n
un: ■ p
op: ■ ueen/
q ■ r at:
715/715 5,441/5,481 2,934/2,934 5,503/5,513 3,220/3,234 liquor: 7,855/7,857
203/203
s t v w x y z
■ s ee/easy: ■ t ot: ■ v
et: ■ w
et: ■ t ax/exit: ■ yak: 55/55 ■ zoo: 240/243
7,598/7,648 5,600/5,644 1,401/1,401 583/592 352/360
■ pension/ ■ partial:
vision: 35/36
121/121 ■ turn/nature:
296/296
■ station:
629/643
■ cautious: 7/7
Note. Bold and italics identify the phonic cell under consideration—hat. A slash (/) shows distinct phonemes for a particular phonic cell—see/
easy. Italics only include a signal letter(s) that is not a part of the sound—consider the letter y that signals the soft g in gym. This table includes
57,542/59,990 discrete transparent cells: 99% transparent.
Table 5
Consonant Di/trigraphs
ch ck dg gh ght gn kn
■ c hin/chemist: ■ ick:
d ■ judge: 55/55 ■ h: 66 unfit
g ■ t aught: ■ s ign: 9/9 ■ knit : 31/31
468/480 333/333 words 144/145 word
endings
ng ph sh tch th wh wr
■ ang/
h ■ hone:
p ■ s hip: ■ atch:
m ■ t hin/this: ■ hich: 83/86
w ■ reck:
w
change: 133/141 488/490 89/89 487/496 ■ who: 4/4 52/53
1,742/1,773 ■ whole: 5/5
Note. Bold and italics identify the phonic cell under consideration—phone. A slash (/) shows distinct phonemes for a particular phonic cell—thin/this.
This table includes 4,123/4,190 discrete transparent cells: 99% transparent.
334 The Reading Teacher Vol. 64, No. 5 February 2011
words), olt (colt; 6/6 words), and oll (roll; 11/13 words), of the five tables. For easy reference, the basic cell
and r-controlled vowels. (Notably, the traditional keywords from the tables follow the generalizations:
short o sound—ox, box, log—represented the first or
1. S ingle vowels usually have their short1 (or
second preferred pronunciation for all but 3 of the
schwa2) sound; except the phonograms in ball
165 transparent words.)
(one-syllable roots), nation, edge (no sound),
Collectively, the other 10 unfit cells appeared in
night, ruby (open-syllable u), fly (one-syllable
just 842 words; these 10 cells included one single
words), and defy; exclude unfit single vowel o,
vowel cell—wa; three -VCe cells—-ile, -ine, -ove;
wa, and r-controlled vowels.
three basic vowel digraphs—ia, io, ou; two vowel (1cat, pet, pig, bug, happy; 2 about, kettle, pupil,
digraph letter combinations—ien, ood; and one con- mucus)
sonant digraph—gh. Conversely, the three transpar-
2. Final single vowel-consonant-e (-VCe) patterns
ent categories of vowels combined showed a ratio of
usually have a long first vowel and a silent final
20,720/22,565 separate transparent basic cells and
e1; except the phonograms for the long sound
phonograms for 92% transparency; the basic and
or short i sound in ace/palace, age/cabbage,
phonogram consonant cells combined revealed a
ate/chocolate, or ice/office, and the sounds in
ratio of 61,665/62,180 cells for 99% transparency. Of
the phonograms in massive, captive, or hand-
the 93 transparent cells, only 1—the fy in defy—fell some; exclude the unfit patterns in -ile, -ine,
below 80% transparency to 78%; 9 cells fell between -ove, and -vowel-r-e.
80% and 89% transparency; and 83 of the cells met (1bake, eke, bike, home, cute)
or exceeded the stringent goal of 90% transparency.
3. Vowel digraphs usually have one sound1 or one
The report systematically organized the basic
of two sounds; 2 except the phonograms in pie
cells, phonograms, and unfit cells into one of the fol-
(ends one-syllable word), diet; mansion; foot,
lowing five general categories: (1) single vowels—cat
book; hound, famous, or house/louse; ex-
or cut; (2) vowels in final single vowel-consonant-e
clude the unfit digraphs ia, io, and ou; the un-
(-VCe) pattern—bate or bite; (3) vowel digraphs—
fit letter patterns ien and ood; and r-controlled
sea or see; (4) single consonants—cat or cut; and (5)
digraphs.
consonant di/trigraphs—thick, wretch. At first, these
(1nail, auto, hay, bee, chief, soap, oil, moon; 2tea/
five categories seemed too straightforward. However, head, row/cow)
a deeper look into letter–sound relationships showed
4. Single consonants usually have one1 or one of
that patterns of triple vowels as in beauty occur infre-
two sounds; 2 except the phonograms in cent,
quently. For example, including the three juxtaposed
city, cycle, special, musician, precious; add-
vowels in the phonograms in precious and cautious,
ed/fixed; gem, magic, gym; pension/vision;
no triple vowel pattern occurred at least 50 times in
turn/nature, partial, station, and cautious.
the list of 16,928 words. Similarly, aside from conso-
(1bib, cat, dad, fat, gut, hit, jet, kit, lit, my, nap,
nant trigraphs in night and match, the letter–sound pat, rut, tub, vet, wet, yak, zoo; 2 see/easy, queen/
relationships of triple single consonants typically liquor, tax/exit)
broke into two or three distinct letter–sound com-
5. C onsonant di/trigraphs usually have one1 or
binations—lit-tle, cost-ly. Quadruple vowel or con-
one of two sounds 2; except the phonogram
sonant combinations—viewing, earthly—occurred
root words who and whole; exclude the unfit
infrequently and showed limited applicability for digraph gh.
beginning or remedial readers. In short, these five (1dick, taught, judge, sign (word ending), knit,
basic patterns, coupled with their phonograms and phone, ship, match, which, wreck; 2 chin/chemi-
excluded unfit cells, robustly systematize the letter– cal, hang/change, thin/this)
sound relationships into a logical arrangement.
Johnston (2001) rightly commented that “simplis-
tic broad generalizations do not capture the com-
Five Phonic Generalizations plexity of English orthography, yet when they are
Written in basic, phonogram, and unfit clauses, each refined and stated in more specific ways there is the
of the following generalizations summarizes one danger that they will become clumsy and complex”
336 The Reading Teacher Vol. 64, No. 5 February 2011
in model CVC one-syllable Students who begin
words—at, bat, cat, fat; to read with automaticity
it, bit, fit, hit; up, cup, pup, in connected text usu-
and so forth. Initially pres- ally require little explicit
ent these in pattern words teaching of words con-
or word families (rhyming taining the 11 unfit cells
clusters); this promotes rap- and other words that lack
id learning of the embedded transparent l etter–sound
phonic cells. As students de- combination s. T hi s may
velop skill, mix the vowels with come with little surprise un-
CVC onset words as well—bat, bet, derstanding that, aside from the r-
bit. Use similar strategies for teaching controlled vowels and single vowel o,
CVCe cells—bake, lake, make; CVV cells— the unfit cells occur relatively infrequently
pea, sea, tea; CCVC cells—chill, chin, chip; and CVCC and knowing that some of these cells conform to the
cells—catch, match, patch. (As used in this article, letter–sound patterns of the basic transparent cells.
CC represents any double or triple consonant combi- For example, the letter combination -ove is transpar-
nation, whether consonant clusters—must/scream— ent in cove and wove but is unfit in love and move.
or di/trigraphs—chill/catch.) Thus, the incidence of unfit cells is significantly less
As mentioned, do not ask students to memorize than the data suggests; this effectually improves the
the phonogram clause of the generalizations. Rather, overall transparency of the language.
when ready, introduce students to selected model Similarly, introduce the r-controlled Vr, -Vre, and
phonogram word families—ball, call, fall; fight, light, VVr patterns, beginning with sample one-syllable
sight; hound, mound, pound; book, hook, look. To words. Interestingly, although the r-controlled single
read increasingly difficult connected text with auto- vowels occurred frequently in the word list, rela-
maticity, students must instantly decode the greater tively few words follow -Vre or VVr letter patterns.
share of the transparent phonograms. A few of the Specifically, aside from the 135 instances of the let-
phonograms, although essential for instant phono- ter combination ear, no -Vre or VVr combination ap-
gram recognition in advanced text, are rarely found peared more than 70 times in the Zeno et al. (1995)
in beginning reading literature and are thus of ques- word list. Regardless, based on student need, teach
tionable merit for explicitly teaching to emergent words with unpredictable phonic cells by making
readers. These, in particular, include the selected individualized class lists of unfit words and review
phonograms in special, musician, precious, partial, these words with students, teaching context clues,
and cautious. Learning to blend the other 88 trans- highlighting morphemic analysis, and reinforcing
parent basic and phonogram cells with automaticity other word attack strategies.
is very doable for most students. As students develop automaticity in reading the
Furthermore, as students move from learning to basic and phonogram cells in sample words and in
decode to independent reading, they automatically connected text, teach them to automatically read
decode many of the phonograms without explicit phonetically transparent two-syllable (tummy, picnic),
instruction. Clearly, proficient readers decode ba- three-syllable (animal, pajamas), and four-syllable
sic single letters and di/trigraphs as easily as they (invitation, celebration) words. Automatic syllabicat-
decipher phonograms and other complex letter pat- ing correlates with increased ability to read text with
terns. For instance, with the same ease in decoding more challenging readability. Finally, although we
the c’s represented in the single consonant and in rarely need to explicitly stress it when we teach de-
the trigraph in the word catch, a skilled reader de- coding, the schwa sound may be introduced as the
codes the more complex c’s embedded in the low- sound heard in the unstressed syllable for the single
frequency phonograms in technician or crucial. As vowels in about, kettle, pupil, and mucus.
emergent readers develop into proficient readers, In comparison to introducing phonic cells one
most will require little help to decode the trans- by one to emergent readers, we recommend identify-
parent phonic patterns, including those in low- ing remedial readers’ gaps of understanding of the
frequency cells. phonic cells and then teaching to these miscues.
338 The Reading Teacher Vol. 64, No. 5 February 2011
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