Skill: long (a) spelling pattern: (ai) and (eigh)
Remember this long vowel rule: When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking, the second does the walking.
Ex: In the word train, “ai” are adjacent (walking side by side). The first vowel “a” is talking (says it’s name – as in the alphabet), the "i" is walking (is silent).
Read the words listed below.
| aim | raid | tail | |
| brain | paid | rail | trail |
| chain | pail | rain | train |
| drain | pain | sail | trait |
| fail | paint | snail | vain |
| gain | plain | sprain | wail |
| jail | quail | stain | wait |
(eigh) says a
| eight | sleigh | neighbor | weight |
(Height and sleight are exceptions to the rule.)
What are the two long (a) patterns used in the words listed above? Write them.
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Can you think of some other words that use the (ai) or (eigh) pattern? Write them.
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Dictation/Spelling Practice for (ai, eigh) words
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Read these sentences.
- I mailed eighteen boxes.
- The snail made an eight-inch trail.
- I had to wait in the rain for the train.
- Jake ate eight plain pancakes in jail
- Did the maid paint the rail?
- I am afraid I gained too much weight.
- Does the word tail rhyme with jail?
- My neighbor’s horse says, “neigh.”
- It was raining when I sprained my hand on a rail.
- I see a snail in the rain under the sleigh.
- He failed to paint the plain wood chair.
- The train whistle sings and sings in my brain.
- I laid my dog's chain on my neighbor's steps.
- I saw eight quail on a trail at Torrey Pines.
- I had to wait until the waitress brought the main dish.
- The train has lots of freight cars.
- I got my neighbor’s mail today.
- The mail train sails along the rails.
- She waits in vain to see the sails.
- The rain in Spain falls on the plain.
- A trail of theft will land you in jail.
Create your own sentence, include one or more words that have the long a spelling pattern (ai) or (eigh). Your writing should reflect good penmanship, proper spacing, and correct usage of upper and lowercase letters. Do not mix upper and lowercase letters. Remember all sentences begin with a capital letter and end with a period (.), question mark (?), or exclamation point (!).
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Please illustrate your sentence.
The letter a in the English
language can have several distinct pronunciations.
Lesson
11 dealt with the ar pattern
as in arm. Long
a as in bake is treated in the
previous and current lesson, and Lesson 41 covers a as
in care. The remaining
a sounds are basically of the
short a variety
such as ask, bad, can (as in Lesson 1) or sofa,
about. For the most part when a is
the first or
last letter of a word, it is pronounced as a
short u. Such
words in
these lessons are treated as sight words. Sight
words do not follow general phonetic rules and
must be learned by repeated exposure to different
examples in reading text.
Student exposure and awareness is sufficient at this time.
| about | alike | apology | attention |
| above | Amanda | around | awake |
| alarm | apiece | assume | away |
| Amanda | cola | mozzarella | pizza |
| ballerina | koala | panda | salsa |
| banana | magenta | papaya | tapioca |
| cafeteria | mama | piñata | tarantula |
| Chihuahua | Maria | pita | yoga |
I have listed a few of the common words that begin or end with “a”, sounding like short “u”. Have the student listen for the sound of short “u” at the beginning or end of the listed words as you read them to the student.