Phonics Approaches

Synthetic Phonics

Synthetic phonics

is a method employed to teach phonics to children when learning to read. This method involves examining every letter within the word as an individual sound in the order in which they appear and then blending those sounds together. For example, shrouds would be read by pronouncing the sounds for each spelling “/ʃ, r, aʊ, d, z/” and then blending those sounds orally to produce a spoken word, “/ʃraʊdz/.” The goal of synthetic phonics instruction is that students identify the sound-symbol correspondences and blend their phonemes automatically.

Analytical phonics

has children analyze sound-symbol correspondences, such as the ou spelling of /aʊ/ in shrouds but students do not blend those elements as they do in synthetic phonics lessons. Furthermore, consonant blends (separate, adjacent consonant phonemes) are taught as units (e.g., in shrouds the shr would be taught as a unit).

Analogy phonics

is a particular type of analytic phonics in which the teacher has students analyze phonic elements according to the phonograms in the word. A phonogram, known in linguistics as a rime, is composed of the vowel and all the sounds that follow it in the syllable. Teachers using the analogy method assist students in memorizing a bank of phonograms, such as -at or -am. Teachers may use learning “word families” when teaching about phonograms. Students then use these phonograms to analogize to unknown words.

Embedded phonics

is the type of phonics instruction used in whole language programs. Embedded phonics differs from other methods in that the instruction is always in the context of literature rather than in separate lessons, and the skills to be taught are identified opportunistically rather than systematically.