Hey, Orton Gillingham, Where Do I Start?

Where do we start? One question I think many tutors and teachers have when beginning Orton Gillingham as a teaching approach with students is, Where do I start? It’s a very reasonable question! My answer would be, start at the beginning. The reason for starting at the beginning is that Orton Gillingham is a sequential and cumulative approach – each part of the Scope & Sequence builds on the next. If you skip something, you may not realize a student doesn’t know it. Even an older student. For example, if you do not start at the beginning by pulling your consonant reading deck...

Sound Spelling Versus Sound Reading

Sound Spelling Versus Sound Reading, What’s the Difference? When taking an Orton Gillingham class, as a student or as a teacher, you will have two terms: Reading Consonant & Vowels and Spelling Consonants & Vowels. What’s the difference in the two? It can get a little confusing. Reading Consonant & Vowel Sounds When going through a consonant reading deck with a student they will use an s two ways, as two sounds, /s/ or /z/. The s can make two sounds, /s/ and /z/. Sound reading is asking, what sounds does this letter (or letter combination) make? Ideas to drill sound reading To drill sound reading, use...

Go Bananas for Schwa

I’ve written about Schwa before, but I’m seeing a lot of questions around this topic so I want to take a deeper dive into the topic of Schwa. What is a Schwa? Schwa is a term used when a vowel takes on (or gets “swallowed up” by) the “uh” (?) sound. Any vowel can do this and some vowel combinations make the sound as well, for example, doctor (the or takes on a schwa sound) or dollar, (the ar is a schwa). Schwa is represented with an upside-down e. Because any a, e, i, o, u, or y can make this sound, and...

A Deeper Dive into Generalizations OI/OY, OU/OW, AU/AW

I’ve written about Orton Gillingham Generalizations before, but I want to take a deeper dive into this topic. What Are Generalization Rules? Generalizations or Generalization Rules are vowel teams that sound alike and also have general rules or situations for when to use them. There are three: OI/OY saying “oi” as in oil/boyOU/OW saying “ou” as in out/cowAU/AW saying “ô” as in auto/paw Generalizations are rules associated with certain sounds that help know when to use each vowel team and in what position to use them in a word. They are tools for spelling and reading words. When do you use each Generalization? OI/OY Generalization Use...

No Stress Over Accenting Rules

Accenting is something that can be taught early in Orton Gillingham, but the advanced rules are for advanced decoding and fall much later in the OG scope and sequence. Accenting is to aid in pronouncing words correctly – that’s the goal. If a student looks a word up in a dictionary (online these days) and sees an accent mark, they will know how to use that accent mark to pronounce the word. Early Accenting These first, simple accenting exercises are to introduce accenting. Say it both ways. The best way to teach early accenting is to have the student say the word both ways and...

REVLOC Game Online, Fun with Syllable Division

Syllable labeling and division is a major foundation of the Orton Gillingham approach. I posted, April 2020, a REVLOC game with a printout that you could cut out and have students sort syllables. Now, with many kids learning from home, I created a sorting game online. https://www.flippity.net/ma.php?k=1Fb5Sk5wEpfq4MPN-HpSjPpFaYggAUm1aDKEpaaoyAWM How To Play The colored blocks (at the bottom of the board) are the REVLOC + Misc. for each grid square. A student will need to drag those REVLOC letters to the top of each square in the grid. They can then drag each syllable to the appropriate square in REVLOC. If you have...

Scope and Sequence Is the Ship, You Are the Captain

A scope and sequence is a plan – the teaching of a subject (the scope) in a specific sequence.  Many subjects have scope and sequence plans. Orton Gillingham is no different – it is an extensive subject that needs to be broken down into bites for easy digestion if someone is going to teach it (and learn it). There are different scope and sequences in Orton Gillingham. The scope and sequence that is used to teach a course to those who will teach or tutor OG is different than the scope and sequence a teacher or tutor will use to...

Feel the Flow with Fluency Stories

Fluency stories are important in all phonics and reading programs, not just Orton Gillingham, and if you are an educator reading this post, I don’t need to tell you all the stats and reasons. I would like to say that in Orton Gillingham I love to use fluency stories to reinforce rules, introduce new words, and check progress on concepts, and of course reading fluency. In fluency stories, you’ll find that not all words are easy for the reader. Don’t expect a student to have expression and automaticity in the first pass of a story, or even the second, and maybe...

You’re in Possession of Orton Gillingham Possessive Rules

Possessive rules can be easy, but can also get a little tricky when we move beyond just adding ‘s. Possessive Rules are all about ownership and can be narrowed down to a couple of categories: singular and plural. Singular Possessive Rule Singular Possessive Rule is to show ownership for a singular owner, add ‘s to the singular form of the noun. For example: the eyes of my sister would become my sister’s eyes. Practice! Sample 1: The pony’s tail is fluffy. Ask the student: Who owns something? (the pony), What is the possessive of the pony? (pony’s), What does the pony own? (its tail) Sample 2: The book’s...

Stores of Plural Rules

Without even thinking, we turn many singular words plural in our language. I might go to the grocery store, or the first store didn’t have what I needed, so I went to grocery stores. In many cases, like the word store, we just add an s and move on. But what if it’s not that simple? Orton Gillingham makes learning much easier by giving us rules. Luckily, there are the following plural rules to help out. Photo by Kaique Rocha on Pexels.com In dividing plural rules, we have five categories. CH, SH, S, X, Z Plural Rule CH, SH, S, X, Z Plural...