Teaching Short Vowel Sounds

Those short vowel sounds can really trip up our young readers. Several of the vowels sound so similar it’s no wonder that they can be so tricky. Discrimination activities, such as this vowel sticks activity, can help our students hear the differences between the sounds. Several years ago I attended a training based on Orton Gillingham methods and the training introduced a strategy called vowel intensives. Because those vowels can be so tricky, repeated practice is necessary- even if it’s just for a few minutes before introducing new phonics skills.

When teaching short vowels, be sure to differentiate this activity. You can do this by choosing which and how many vowels to use during instruction. You may want to start with only two vowels for those students who are really having a difficult time with the sounds and then add more vowels as they become more proficient with this skill. You can then increase the difficulty of this task by providing CVC words (e.g. cat, bet, web) and having your students hold up the correct vowel.

Making your own vowel sticks is super easy. Simply print the pictures/letters on card stock and glue them on a large craft stick using a hot glue gun. Each vowel has a letter only and a letter with a picture cue. You may want to glue them back to back.