This online activity is designed for beginning and struggling readers to help them recognize word patterns and learn about onset and rime. Students are first asked to select a vowel, and are then presented with a series of words to sort into short-vowel word families. Students can then print their completed word family chart and use it to practice reading the words fluently.

This activity is modeled after the word family sort referenced in Small Group Reading Instruction: A Differentiated Teaching Model for Beginning and Struggling Readers by Beverly Tyner (International Reading Association, 2004).

Visit this interactive tool at: http://www.readwritethink.org/materials/wordfamily/.

ReadWriteThink Lessons That Use This Tool

Getting the ig in Pig: Helping Children Discover Onset and Rime (K-2)
This phonics lesson offers a clear instructional format for teaching onset and rime. The ig rime is demonstrated through the use of literature, independent and cooperative learning, critical thinking, and hands-on activities. Instruction is conducted in both an explicit and implicit manner.

Hey Diddle, Diddle! Generating Rhymes for Analogy-Based Phonics Instruction (K-2)
First-grade teachers can use analogy-based phonics (i.e., learning words based on word families) before other phonological skills, such as rhyme, are in place. This lesson focuses on an informal assessment of students' identification of rhyme in the context of a poem and manipulation of online picture cards.

Sort, Hunt, Write: A Weekly Spelling Program (3-5)
This set of lesson plans provides you with ways to make daily spelling instruction appropriate and engaging. Students will engage in a wide range of activities that will help them deepen their understanding of word patterns.

Teaching Short-Vowel Discrimination Using Dr. Seuss Rhymes (K-2)
Students develop phonemic and phonetic awareness through word study of common short-vowel word families. Students will use Dr. Seuss rhymes to discover and explore the sounds and spellings of different short vowel word families.

Whole-to-Parts Phonics Instruction: Teaching Letter-Sound Correspondences (K-2)
In this lesson, students are exposed to whole-to-parts phonics instruction. After a story has been read to, with, and by children, the teacher assists them in analyzing spoken words by focusing on onset and rime. Students use onset-rime analogies to identify words that belong to the same word family.

Word Recognition Strategies Using Nursery Rhymes (K-2)
This lesson uses familiar nursery rhymes to draw attention to words that end with the same letters. Kindergarten and first-grade students are encouraged to create word family lists and compare them to words in different word families.

Word Sorts for Beginning and Struggling Readers (K-2)
This lesson uses a hands-on word sort to introduce beginning and struggling readers to short-vowel word families. In addition to learning onset and rime, students practice fluent reading and spelling of the words.