Y Spelling Vowels I and E and How to Teach It: Phonics Rules for Teachers Ep 19

Y as a vowel in English is more common than you might think. In fact, y spells vowel sounds more than it spells a consonant sound. Y often spells the long i and long e sounds, and it can spell the short i sound as well. In fact, y spells a vowel sound in 2041 words while it spells the consonant sound in yes in only 57 words. How can you know where we find y spelling i and e and how to use it? Let's take a look when we see y representing these vowels at the end of words in English and how to teach it to your students.

With 10 years of classroom experience, former teacher Martha Moore hosts the Phonics Rules for Teachers Podcast. Drawing from her personal journey, she shares insights on transitioning from traditional teaching methods to a phonics-centered approach and the impact it has on students' reading and writing.

Each week , Martha shares a simple phonics rule, strategy, or background information and how you can teach it in your classroom.

You can find the How the Heck to Teach 'Em supplementary resource to go along with this series here: https://www.myprimaryparadise.com/shop/phonics-rules-resources/

Transcript

Did you know that "Y" represents vowel sounds more than it represents consonant sounds? It's true, and today we're going to take a look at "Y" as a vowel at the end of a word.

Welcome to episode 19 of *Phonics Rules for Teachers and How the Heck to Teach Them*. I'm Martha, and today we're going to take a look at "Y" as a vowel. Specifically, we're going to be taking a look at "Y" at the end of a word or syllable, spelling the long "E" or the long "I" sound.

Did you know that "Y" spells its consonant sound, the sound we hear in the word "yes," in only 57 words? But "Y" spells a vowel sound in 241 words in the English language. That's right, "Y" spells vowel sounds far more often than it spells its consonant sound. So today, we're going to look at when "Y" spells "I" and "Y" spells "E" at the end of a word or syllable in English.

First, let's take a look at when "Y" spells the long "I" sound in an English word. In English, words typically do not end with the letter "I." This is true unless a word has been borrowed from another language, for example, "koi," which comes from Japanese, or if they are slang or shortened forms of a word, for example, "hi," which is a shortened version of the word "hello." For this reason, when we hear the long "I" sound at the end of a one-syllable word, it is most often spelled with a single "Y." There are 128 words in English that have this pattern where we have a single-syllable word that ends with the letter "Y" spelling a long "I" sound. Some examples of this are "by," "my," "fly," "why," and "try." Because these words are ending with a single letter spelling a vowel sound, these are considered open syllable words, which I have covered in a previous episode. If you want to learn more about open syllable words, you can check that episode out.

Now, let's take a look at when "Y" spells the long "E" sound at the end of a word. In English, we typically spell the long "E" sound at the end of a two or more syllable word with a single "Y." This can include words that end with just a single "Y," such as "baby," "angry," "every," and "icy." This can also include words that have the suffix "-ly," for example, "happily," "angrily," "suddenly," "scientifically," or "nearly." In fact, "Y" spells the long "E" sound more often than it spells the long "I" sound. There are 1,628 words where "Y" spells the long "E" sound at the end of a word.

There are a few exceptions to this rule, so let's take a look at those. There are some multisyllabic words where there's a "Y" at the end that spells a long "I" sound. Some examples are "reply," "multiply," and "falsify." Sometimes we have compound words where we see this as well. A compound word is where we put two words together to make a new word. Some examples of this are "dragonfly" or "hereby." Again, this is why when we explain these spelling patterns to our students, we use words like "typically" or "generally" or "most of the time." If they know that they can spell both long "I" and long "E" with a "Y," and they come to a word where "Y" is not spelling the expected sound, they know that they can try the other sound as an option.

Now, if we're talking about "Y" as a vowel, we have to take a look at when we add endings to words, because it can seem a little bit confusing or complicated on understanding that "Y" is replacing an "I" or an "E" at the end of the word. There are some things to keep in mind. One, two "I"s cannot be next to each other in an English word. If the suffix begins with a letter other than "I," the "Y" in the root word becomes an "I." For example, "happy" becomes "happiness," or "puppy" becomes "puppies." If the suffix does begin with an "I," for example, "-ing," the "Y" remains. Examples are "cry" becomes "crying," "baby" becomes "babying," and "study" becomes "studying."

This rule has what would be considered a large number of exceptions, but as you'll see, it's still a rather small percentage. There are 14 words that keep their "Y" when you would expect it to change to an "I." This is only 1% of the words that are ending in "Y" in the English language. These words are "baby," "flyer," "dryness," "flyable," "shy," "shyness," "sly," "slyest," "spryly," "spryness," "spry," "slyer," "shyest," and "shyly." As you notice, many of these are the same root word with different endings.

Now, let's take a look at how to teach "Y" spelling the long "I" and the long "E" sounds at the end of words. I always say when teaching phonics to start with the simplest and the most common sound. However, when it comes to these sounds, I take a different approach. While "Y" spelling long "E" is more common, it is also found in two or more syllable words. This means it's a more complex spelling pattern because students need to be able to read multisyllabic words in order to work on this skill. For that reason, I begin by teaching "Y" spelling the long "I" sound at the end of one-syllable words. So let's take a look at how I do that.

One, I start by reviewing open syllables. Have students give some examples of open syllable words: "no," "go," "she," "we," for example. Then say the word "by." Ask your students what sound they hear in the word "by" (B and I). Ask them to help you spell each sound. After writing the "B," you can remind them that they have already learned that words in English do not end with the letter "I." Explain that when we hear the long "I" sound at the end of a one-syllable word, we often spell that with the letter "Y." Have students brainstorm some words that rhyme with "by" and write them up as well. Some examples are "fly," "try," "cry," "my," "spy," "sly," and "fry." If they say words like "pie" and "tie," you can write them down in a separate list. If you've already learned about silent "E," you can remind them that we also use a silent "E" to prevent words in English from ending in an "I." You can also share this visual with them to help them understand this skill. Then you can take some time to practice reading and spelling words in context with this sound.

You can add this to your daily sound drill, take some time to map words, read decodable texts, have students create targeted journal entries, or use any of the 12 strategies that I've shared in *Phonics Rules for Teachers*. The more your students have the opportunity to practice reading and writing, the easier it will be for them to understand and use this concept.

Once students have a solid understanding of "Y" spelling "I" at the end of one-syllable words, you can move on to teaching them that "Y" spells "E" at the end of two or more syllable words. I like to introduce this by comparing both of these spelling patterns. Write some words where "Y" is spelling "I" at the end of some one-syllable words ("my," "by," "try," for example) and then write some simple two-syllable words where "Y" is spelling "E" (for example, "tiny," "baby," and "silly"). Tell students that in these words, "Y" is spelling the long "E" sound. Practice reading the words together and explain that typically "Y" spells the long "E" sound at the end of two or more syllable words.

And then, of course, from there you can continue to practice. A great activity for this is to have students practice sorting words and mapping words in addition to having them use all of those activities and strategies that, again, I've previously shared that you can use for any phonics skill. From there, continue practicing this skill, both reading and writing, until your students are confident and able to read and write words with both of these spelling patterns.

And there you have it. That's how you can teach students that typically "Y" spells "I" at the end of one-syllable words and "Y" spells "E" at the end of two or more syllable words most of the time.

Thank you so much for joining me this week. I hope that you learned a lot, and don't forget to like and subscribe so you never miss an episode of *Phonics Rules for Teachers and How the Heck to Teach Them*. See you next time!

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