Language Interactive Games

http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/interactive/literacy.html#ph

Similes

This is a list of well known AS...AS similes. There are more similes, of course, some common and others less common because anyone can make a simile at any time--you too!

simile	meaning	comment
as alike as two peas in a pod	identical or nearly so
as bald as a coot	completely bald
as big as a bus	very big
as big as an elephant	very big
as black as a sweep	completely black	sweep = chimney sweep
as black as coal	completely black
as black as pitch	completely black
as blind as a bat	completely blind	may be exaggeration
as blind as a mole	completely blind	may be exaggeration
as bold as brass	very bold	usually in a negative sense
as brave as a lion	very brave
as bright as a button	very bright
as bright as a new pin	very bright and shiny
as busy as a beaver	very busy
as busy as a bee	very busy
as busy as a cat on a hot tin roof	very busy
as calm as a millpond	very calm and still	usually said of water
as clear as a bell	very clear	of a sound
as clean as a whistle	very clean
as clear as crystal	very clear
as clear as mud	not at all clear	irony/sarcasm
as cold as ice	very cold
as common as dirt	very common, rude, vulgar	usually said of a person
as cool as a cucumber	cool
as cunning as a fox	cunning
as dead as a doornail	dead
as dead as the dodo	dead, extinct	the dodo is an extinct bird
as deaf as a post	completely deaf	may be exaggeration
as different as chalk from cheese	very different
as drunk as a lord	completely drunk
as dry as a bone	very dry
as dry as dust	very dry
as dull as dishwater	dull, boring	usually said of a person
as easy as A.B.C.	very easy
as easy as apple-pie	very easy
as flat as a pancake	completely flat
as free as a bird	very free to go anywhere
as fresh as a daisy	very fresh
as gentle as a lamb	very gentle	usually said of a person
as good as gold	very good and obedient	usually said of a person
as happy as a lark	very happy	usually said of a person
as hard as nails	very tough in character	of a person
as hot as hell	very hot
as hungry as a bear	very hungry
as hungry as a wolf	very hungry
as innocent as a lamb	innocent, not worldly-wise	usually said of a person
as large as life	conspicuously present
as light as a feather	very light
as light as air	very light
as mad as a hatter	completely crazy
as mad as a hornet	very angry
as nutty as a fruitcake	completely crazy
as obstinate as a mule	very obstinate, stubborn
as old as the hills	very, very old
as pale as death	very pale or white in the face	of a person
as plain as day	very clear
as poor as a church mouse	poverty-stricken
as poor as dirt	poverty-stricken
as proud as a peacock	very proud
as pure as snow	pure and innocent
as pure as the driven snow	pure and innocent
as quick as a wink	very quick(ly)
as quick as lightning	very quick(ly)
as quick as silver	very quick
as quiet as a church mouse	very quiet
as safe as houses	very safe, secure
as scarce as hen's teeth	very, very scarce	irony (hens have no teeth)
as sharp as a razor	very sharp
as sick as a dog	very sick
as sick as a parrot	very sick
as silent as the dead	completely silent
as silent as the grave	completely silent
as slippery as an eel	slippery, evasive, not to be trusted	of a person
as slow as a snail	very slow
as slow as a tortoise	very slow
as smooth as silk	very smooth
as snug as a bug in a rug	in a very comfortable position	humorous
as sober as a judge	sober
as solid as a rock	solid
as solid as the ground we stand on	solid
as sound as a bell	very clear	of a sound
as sour as vinegar	very sour
as steady as a rock	very steady
as stiff as a board	completely stiff
as straight as an arrow	straight	an arrow flies straight
as strong as an ox	very strong
as stubborn as a mule	very stubborn, obstinate
as sturdy as an oak	very strong and solid
as sure as death and taxes	absolutely certain to happen
as tall as a giraffe	very tall
as thin as a rake	very thin
as timid as a rabbit	very timid
as tough as leather	very tough
as tough as nails	very tough	often said of a person
as tough as old boots	very tough	often said of a person
as welcome as a skunk at a lawn party	not welcome at all	irony/sarcasm (skunks stink)
as white as a ghost	very pale or white in the face	of a person
as white as a sheet	pure white
as white as snow	pure white
as wise as Solomon	very wise	King Solomon
as wise as an owl	very wise

« Similes
Caution: Many similes are clichés (phrases that are overused and betray a lack of original thought). You should use well-know similes with care, but it is certainly useful to know them so that you can understand language that contains them

Phonics Lesson

Phonics Blending

Spelling Word Practice Tips

5 Activities to Help Students Who Struggle with Spelling

Shaving Cream Spelling Activity - Megan Sheakoski

Fun, meaningful activities for successful spelling lesson practice that can be used with kids with learning disabilities!

Students with learning disabilities, or those who struggle with reading, can often find spelling a challenge. Even those wo aced reading may still have nightmares about spelling tests. Spelling tests used to require rote memorization of ten words each week with a test on Friday. Studying for spelling tests meant writing every word ten times each. Thankfully those days are gone! We now know that repetitive writing does not give the brain a chance to make sense of and categorize a new word. Long-term memorization occurs when students interact with words in a variety of ways.
Use the following interactive activities to spice up spelling and increase student success!

 

 

1. Word Detective

After spelling words are introduced to students invite them to become detectives. Arm them with highlighter tape (found at teacher supply stores) and a pretend magnifying glass. Tell them they need to sleuth out all of the spelling words they can find as they read. Choose books you have previewed for spelling words and instruct them to put highlighting tape over each word. Review the words found and help identify any they have missed. Award “Good Detective” /


2. Word Walls

 

Designate an area as the Word Wall. It can be a wall, a door painted with magnetic paint, a bulletin board, a file folder, etc. Affix the letters of the alphabet leaving space underneath each one. Have students add their spelling word under the appropriate letter. Display for reference in writing or reading. Play game with the words daily such as, clapping for each letter while spelling all the “A” words.
3. Shaving Cream
Spray a dollop of shaving cream on each desk or table. Have the students smooth it out with their hands. Then as spelling words are called out or used in a sentence each student can use their finger to write the word. Any mistakes can be smoothed out and written again. After writing the word they can draw a picture in the shaving cream to represent the word. Shaving cream is a fun, kinesthetic way to practice spelling and an easy way to clean desks!

4. Sand

Have the students write a sentences or a paragraph using their spelling words. Then have them trace each spelling word in glue and sprinkle sand over it. As they reread the story have them use their index fingers to trace the spelling words. They can then cut out the words into cards and quiz themselves with their eyes closed. Their fingers “read” as their brain processes each word in a new way.

5. Word Sorts

Make a set of word cards for each student. The word cards include all of the current spelling words and words from previous lists that may be similar. The students then sort, or group, the words into categories. The categories can be selected by the teacher or created by the students. Examples of categories might be words with the same vowel sound, rhyming words, or words with the same ending.
These spelling activities are fun for practice, but also can serve as great informal assessments. How much more exciting would spelling tests be in shaving cream or in sand? Thinking outside of the box will help your students achieve spelling success!

 

Phonics Songs

Watch this useful video for teaching phonics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqaP19rUwz4&feature=fvsr

Blending and Segmenting

Blending and Segmenting Games

Children who can segment and blend sounds easily are able to use this knowledge when reading and spelling. Segmenting and blending individual sounds can be difficult at the beginning. Our recommendation is to begin with segmenting and blending syllables. Once familiar with that, students will be prepared for instruction and practice with individual sounds.

  Share your examples!

When beginning readers sound out words, they slowly say each sound in a word (c-a-t), and then say the sounds quickly together to "read" the word (cat). In reading, teachers call this blending because sounds are being blended together. Blending (combining sounds) and segmenting (separating sounds) are skills that are necessary for learning to read.
Developing a child's phonological awareness is an important part of developing a reader. Many research studies indicate that kids who have weak phonological awareness also have weak reading skills.
The figure below shows how the teaching of segmenting and blending should progress, starting at the sentence level, moving to syllable, and finally to individual phonemes. Be sure to provide lots of practice at the easier level before moving on.

Why teach blending and segmenting?

• Teaching the skills of segmentation in isolation or in combination with blending instruction helps with successful reading development

When to use:	Before reading	During reading	After reading
How to use:	Individually	With small groups	Whole class setting

Blending

Guess-the-word game

This activity, from our article Phonological Awareness: Instructional and Assessment Guidelines, is an example of how to teach students to blend and identify a word that is stretched out into its basic sound elements.
Objective: Students will be able to blend and identify a word that is stretched out into its component sounds.
Materials needed: Picture cards of objects that students are likely to recognize such as: sun, bell, fan, flag, snake, tree, book, cup, clock, plane
Activity: Place a small number of picture cards in front of children. Tell them you are going to say a word using "Snail Talk" a slow way of saying words (e.g., /fffffllllaaaag/). They have to look at the pictures and guess the word you are saying. It is important to have the children guess the answer in their head so that everyone gets an opportunity to try it. Alternate between having one child identify the word and having all children say the word aloud in chorus to keep children engaged.

Robot talk

Talking in "Robot Talk," students hear segmented sounds and put them together (blend them) into words.
See example > (80K PDF)*
Note: To see all Blending/Segmenting Activities from this site, visit here.

Blending slide

The "Reading Genie" offers teachers a simple way to teach students about blends. Teachers can use a picture or small replica of a playground slide and have the sounds "slide" together to form a word.
See example >

Oral blending activity

The information here describes the importance of teaching blending skills to young children. This link provides suggestions for oral sound blending activities to help students practice and develop smooth blending skills.
See example >

Sound blending using songs

This website describes how songs can also be used for blending activities. The following activity (see Yopp, M., 1992) is to the tune of "If You're Happy and You Know It, Clap Your Hands."
If you think you know this word, shout it out!
If you think you know this word, shout it out!
If you think you know this word,
Then tell me what you've heard,
If you think you know this word, shout it out!
After singing, the teacher says a segmented word such as /k/ /a/ /t/ and students provide the blended word "cat."

Segmenting

This activity, from our article Phonological Awareness: Instructional and Assessment Guidelines is an example of how to teach students to segment, first with sentences, then words, and finally sounds.

1. Early in phonological awareness instruction, teach children to segment sentences into individual words. Identify familiar short poems such as "I scream you scream we all scream for ice cream!" Have children clap their hands with each word.
2. As children advance in their ability to manipulate oral language, teach them to segment words into syllables or onsets and rimes. For example, have children segment their names into syllables: e.g., Ra-chel, Al-ex-an-der, and Rod-ney.
3. When children have learned to remove the first phoneme (sound) of a word, teach them to segment short words into individual phonemes: e.g., s-u-n, p-a-t, s-t-o-p.

Segmenting cheer activity

This link provides teachers with information on how to conduct the following segmentation cheer activity.
See example > (32K PDF)*
Write the "Segmentation Cheer" on chart paper, and teach it to children. Each time you say the cheer, change the words in the third line. Have children segment the word sound by sound. Begin with words that have three phonemes, such as ten, rat, cat, dog, soap, read, and fish.
Segmentation Cheer
Listen to my cheer.
Then shout the sounds you hear.
Sun! Sun! Sun!
Let's take apart the word sun.
Give me the beginning sound. (Children respond with /s/.)
Give me the middle sound. (Children respond with /u/.)
Give me the ending sound. (Children respond with /n/.)
That's right!
/s/ /u/ /n/-Sun! Sun! Sun!

Segmenting with puppets

Teachers can use the activity found on this website to help teach students about segmenting sounds. The activity includes the use of a puppet and downloadable picture cards.

The sounds of English and the International Phonetic Alphabet

© Tomasz P. Szynalski, Antimoon.com

This chart contains all the sounds (phonemes) used in the English language. For each sound, it gives:

• The symbol from the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), as used in phonetic transcriptions in modern dictionaries for English learners — that is, in A. C. Gimson’s phonemic system with a few additional symbols.
  The chart represents British and American phonemes with one symbol. One symbol can mean two different phonemes in American and British English. See the footnotes for British-only and American-only symbols.
• Two English words which use the sound. The underline shows where the sound is heard.
• The links labeled Amer and Brit play sound recordings (Flash is required) where the words are pronounced in American and British English. The British version is given only where it is very different from the American version.

To print the chart, use the printable PDF version.

vowels IPA examples listen   ʌ cup, luck Amer   ɑ: arm, father Amer / Brit   æ cat, black Amer   e met, bed Amer 1 ə away, cinema Amer 2 ɜ:ʳ turn, learn Amer / Brit 2 ɪ hit, sitting Amer   i: see, heat Amer   ɒ hot, rock Amer / Brit 3 ɔ: call, four Amer / Brit 4 5 ʊ put, could Amer   u: blue, food Amer   aɪ five, eye Amer   aʊ now, out Amer   eɪ say, eight Amer   oʊ go, home Amer 6 ɔɪ boy, join Amer   eəʳ where, air Amer / Brit 1 7 ɪəʳ near, here Amer / Brit 7 ʊəʳ pure, tourist Amer / Brit 7

consonants IPA examples listen   b bad, lab Amer   d did, lady Amer   f find, if Amer   g give, flag Amer   h how, hello Amer   j yes, yellow Amer   k cat, back Amer   l leg, little Amer   m man, lemon Amer   n no, ten Amer   ŋ sing, finger Amer   p pet, map Amer   r red, try Amer 8 s sun, miss Amer   ʃ she, crash Amer   t tea, getting Amer 9 tʃ check, church Amer   θ think, both Amer   ð this, mother Amer   v voice, five Amer   w wet, window Amer   z zoo, lazy Amer   ʒ pleasure, vision Amer   dʒ just, large Amer

1. 1. Almost all dictionaries use the e symbol for the vowel in bed. The problem with this convention is that e in the IPA does not stand for the vowel in bed; it stands for a different vowel that is heard, for example, in the German word Seele, or at the beginning of the eɪ sound in English. The “proper” symbol for the bed vowel is ɛ (do not confuse with ɜ:). The same goes for eə vs. ɛə.
2. 2. In əʳ and ɜ:ʳ, the ʳ is not pronounced in BrE, unless the sound comes before a vowel (as in answering, answer it). In AmE, the ʳ is always pronounced, and the sounds are sometimes written as ɚ and ɝ.
3. 3. In AmE, ɑ: and ɒ are one vowel, so calm and cot have the same vowel. In American transcriptions, hot is written as hɑ:t.
4. 4. About 40% of Americans pronounce ɔ: the same way as ɑ:, so that caught and cot have the same vowel. See cot-caught merger.
5. 5. In American transcriptions, ɔ: is often written as ɒ: (e.g. law = lɒ:), unless it is followed by r, in which case it remains an ɔ:.
6. 6. In British transcriptions, oʊ is usually represented as əʊ. For some BrE speakers, oʊ is more appropriate (they use a rounded vowel) — for others, the proper symbol is əʊ. For American speakers, oʊ is usually more accurate.
7. 7. In eəʳ ɪəʳ ʊəʳ, the r is not pronounced in BrE, unless the sound comes before a vowel (as in dearest, dear Ann). In AmE, the r is always pronounced, and the sounds are often written as er ɪr ʊr.
8. 8. All dictionaries use the r symbol for the first sound in red. The problem with this convention is that r in the IPA does not stand for the British or American r; it stands for the “hard” r that is heard, for example, in the Spanish word rey or Italian vero. The “proper” symbol for the red consonant is ɹ.
9. 9. In American English, t is often pronounced as a flap t, which sounds like d or (more accurately) like the quick, hard r heard e.g. in the Spanish word pero. For example: letter. Some dictionaries use the t ̬ symbol for the flap t.

special symbols

IPA	what it means
ˈ	The vertical line (ˈ) is used to show word stress. It is placed before the stressed syllable in a word. For example, /ˈkɒntrækt/ is pronounced like this, and /kənˈtrækt/ like that. Word stress is explained in our article about phonetic transcription.
ʳ	ʳ is not a sound — it is a short way of saying that an r is pronounced only in American English. For example, if you write that the pronunciation of bar is /bɑ:ʳ/, you mean that it is /bɑ:r/ in American English, and /bɑ:/ in British English. However, in BrE, r will be heard if ʳ is followed by a vowel. For example, far gone is pronounced /ˈfɑ: ˈgɒn/ in BrE, but far out is pronounced /ˈfɑ: ˈraʊt/.
i	i is usually pronounced like a shorter version of i:, but sometimes (especially in an old-fashioned British accent) it can sound like ɪ. Examples: very /ˈveri/, create /kriˈeɪt/, previous /ˈpri:viəs/, ability /əˈbɪlɪti/.
əl	əl means that the consonant l is pronounced as a separate syllable (the syllabic l, which sounds like a vowel), or that there is a short ə sound before it. Examples: little /ˈlɪtəl/, uncle /ˈʌŋkəl/. Instead of the əl symbol, some dictionaries use an l with a small vertical line underneath, or simply l, as in /ˈlɪtl/.
ən	ən means that the consonant n is pronounced as a separate syllable (the syllabic n, which sounds like a vowel), or that there is a short ə sound before it. Examples: written /ˈrɪtən/, listen /ˈlɪsən/. Instead of the ən symbol, some dictionaries use an n with a small vertical line underneath, or simply n, as in /ˈrɪtn/.

Does this chart list all the sounds that you can hear in British and American English?

No. This page contains symbols used in phonetic transcriptions in modern dictionaries for English learners. It does not list all the possible sounds in American or British English.
For example, this page does not list the regular t (heard in this pronunciation of letter) and the flap t (heard in this one) with separate symbols. It groups them under a single symbol: t. (In other words, it groups a number of similar sounds under a single phoneme, for simplicity. To understand how sounds are grouped into phonemes, read the article on phonemic transcription.)
So this page actually lists phonemes (groups of sounds), not individual sounds. Each symbol in the chart can correspond to many different (but similar) sounds, depending on the word and the speaker’s accent.
Take the phoneme p in the above chart. It occurs in the phonemic transcriptions of pin /pɪn/ and spin /spɪn/. In pin, this phoneme is pronounced with aspiration (breathing). This “aspirated p” sound has its own special symbol in the IPA: pʰ. In spin, the phoneme is pronounced “normally”; this “normal p” sound is represented by p in the IPA. So the p phoneme represents two sounds: p and pʰ. (This can be confusing, because p can mean both the p phoneme and the p sound.)

Typing the phonetic symbols

You won’t find phonetic symbols on your computer’s keyboard. How do you type them in a Word document, e-mail message, or SuperMemo collection? There are two solutions:

• You can go to the IPA phonetic keyboard at ipa.typeit.org, type your transcriptions, and copy & paste them to your document.
• You can use the ASCII Phonetic Alphabet, which replaces IPA symbols with characters that you can type on your keyboard.

Learning to pronounce the sounds