How to Teach Spelling with Letter Tiles

Using letter tiles for teaching spelling is a great way to immediately improve the effectiveness of your spelling instruction. There is a tile for each of the basic phonograms. The letter tiles are used to demonstrate new concepts in a spelling lesson and to practice spelling new words.

The tiles don't take the place of spelling with paper and pencil; rather, the tiles act as a fantastic learning tool that will enable your student to learn to spell more quickly and accurately and get to the real goal—writing.

Letter tiles turn an idea or concept into something that your student can see and manipulate.

How Letter Tiles Work

Here is an example of how letter tiles can make spelling clear and logical in a student's mind.

There are two ways to spell the sound of /k/ at the
end of a word: ck and k. Let's build the word rock,
placing a blank tile in place of the /k/ sound. 

Now we can teach the simple rule that we use
ck right after a short vowel, and we use k after
everything else. Point to the o and ask the
student, "Is this a short vowel?" 

It is, so we replace the blank tile with the ck tile.

Here is the same thought process with the word
ask. Build the word, using the blank tile for the
/k/ sound.

Ask your student if the tile just before the
blank is a short vowel. 

It becomes clear that the letter k is the correct
choice, because we use k after everything that
isn't a short vowel. 

Benefits of Using the Letter Tiles

As shown above, you can explain new spelling concepts easily and concretely with the manipulatives. There are additional benefits, too:

• The tiles hold your student's attention and make an impression that can be easily remembered later.
• Mistakes are no big deal with the letter tiles. Students feel that it is simpler to exchange tiles than to erase and rewrite a word.
  
  
• For younger students who are still developing fine motor skills and for whom writing is more tiresome, the tiles make it easier for them to stay on task for a longer period of time.
• Many remedial students have had their share of failures with other spelling programs and are hesitant about making more mistakes. The tiles allow them to test or try out a word rather than committing lead to paper.
• Your student gets more spelling practice in each lesson because he first spells the words with the tiles, then he spells the words with paper and pencil.
• Vowels are red and consonants are blue, as shown in the picture above. The different colors help the student visualize the different roles these two types of letters have. For example, students learn that each syllable has a vowel—and they can easily internalize this concept with the colored tiles.

The real power of letter tiles is that explanations of spelling concepts can be made very clear, and the concrete examples "stick" with the student.

Have a question about using letter tiles in your spelling lessons?

Related Article

• How to Teach Spelling in Your Homeschool
• How to Teach Phonograms