Help a Student Learn to Read this Summer: Vowel Clustering Can Help

Help a Student Learn to Read this Summer: Vowel Clustering Can Help

by Elaine Clanton Harpine, Ph. D

It’s summer, but the schools are saying that many students have suffered learning losses because of the disruptions caused by COVID. The schools are also listing tutoring as one of the best ways to help children over the summer. So, I am focusing my summer efforts on tutoring.

Here’s the first Helpful Hint:

Tutoring Hint #1:

Understanding letter sounds is essential for reading. Not all reading programs teach children how to understand the relationship between letters and the sounds they represent.

Make learning fun this summer. As you teach letter sounds, add hands-on craft projects that focus on letter sounds in your tutoring sessions.

One mistake some people make in teaching letter sounds is to teach children by the first letter in a word, saying these words are similar: bell, bike, ball, book. Unfortunately, although each of these words starts with the same consonant sound—the letter B, the brain does not organize words by beginning letter sounds. When you introduce new words that contain several vowel sounds as in the

example above, it is very confusing to children who are struggling to read. The brain identifies words by (and we learn to pronounce words by) the vowel sound in the word. Therefore, we need to teach children to read by using words that have common vowel sounds: at, cat, fat, hat, mat…. If we teach using the organizational structure that the brain uses, it makes it easier for struggling students to learn. I call it vowel clustering. The children in my reading clinics learn to decode and encode words by vowel sounds. For example, the letter A has 7 sounds and 22 different ways to make those sounds.

This Mr. A puppet from my after-school reading clinic helps children to focus on the different ways to make the long A vowel sound.

Let’s look at an example from my tutoring book showing how to teach vowel sounds. This method works for children, teens, and adults. Go to:

https://www.groupcentered.com/reading-blog/ archives/07-2022

Do you know a child or teen struggling in reading? Let this summer open new doors of success. Tutoring can make the difference.

Reading failure is not just a school problem. Reading failure has also been linked to bullying, violence, and crime. The Department of Education states that 85% of juveniles (teens) going through the juvenile court system are “functionally illiterate” because they cannot read or read very poorly. The Department of Education also found that 70% of adult inmates in American prisons are unable to read above the fourthgrade level. In the same study, the Department of Education states that 21% of the general adult population can only read at or below fifth-grade level. The Nation’s Report Card , which has been tracking reading failure for about 30 years stated that 90% of students who dropped out of school, dropped out because they were failing in reading. The National Center for Educational Statistics also stated that 40% of graduating high school seniors who received diplomas and participated in graduation ceremonies were not prepared for college because of poor reading ability. Over 60% of students in 4th, 8th, and 12th grade have been listed as struggling or failing in reading. Help a student learn to read this summer.

If you need help or have questions, contact me. I am always happy to help. Contact me at clantonharpine@hotmail.com

Have a great summer.

Dr. Elaine Clanton Harpine, Ph. D.