Does anyone know the 'proper' way to explain 'magic e' in phonics?

[owlelf]

DS is in Y1. His School have adopted Read write inc this year (previously Jolly Phonics).

He has guided reaching once a week, and daily WRI sessions, but he doesn't read one to one with a teacher.

Apparently as he is doing well he doesn't get any one to one reading. I feel that this puts added pressure on me to guide him properly at home. I'm very happy to read with him each night, and we both really enjoy bedtime stories. But I do feel pressure to make sure I explain things to him in a way that is consistent with what he is taught in school- otherwise I will confuse him.

Anyway, I know that the term magic e is now outdated. He does struggle over the concept of an 'e' changing a letter sound to a letter name- and I'm not sure if there is a clever way to explain it? I would live to know how this is covered in the read write inc program.

Can anyone help?

[mrz]

how can anyone say the magic e doesn't perform magic?

it makes an a sound like an ay - bloody genius and magical if you ask me!
in have?

it makes an i' sound like an eye - magic
in give?

it makes an o' sound like an ohhh - genius!
in some?

[nickeldaisical]

Euphemia - that makes no sense at all!
the name of I is pronounced Eye, so Like is pronounced L-eye-k

[nickeldaisical]

x-posts mrz

[CecilyP]

how can anyone say the magic e doesn't perform magic?

I know, they will be telling us there's no tooth fairy next! Come to think of it, I had never heard the term till I was an adult, but was taught the concept. Of course it doesn't work for all words, it's English we are talking about.

[mrz]

Many of my class say laik for like and try to spell it that way

[Elibean]

dd1 had magic 'e's, dd2 hasn't.

Admittedly, they live in SW London and no accent affecting the outcome, but have to say they have both learned to read at pretty much the same pace and with the same ease/occasional difficulties.

They both seemed to accept that rules have exceptions, and in their case I honestly don't think it matters much whether they are taught with or without magic.

That said, dd2 has a friend who finds 'rule breaking' words far harder to tolerate - they annoy him intensely - and apparently many of his 5 year old friends feel the same.

[WhoKnowsWhereTheTimeGoes]

So for the words like some, where the magic e does not apply, presumably that isn't a split digraph either? What would it be?

[nickeldaisical]

Euph - i se. it does depend on accents a lot - they have to teach based on accent, so.
(same as the a in grass wher i come from isn't the same as the a where i live now)

[EnjoyGOLDResponsibly]

The parents in Dss class were edumacated on this last week, but our school uses smiley e now I.e.

The word is LAKE, if you sounded it out you'd get LE AH CK

But if you can draw a smile under the word linking the A and the E, the A stops sounding like soft AH and becomes hard A, so LE A CK

The same applies for all vowels where there's a silent E in the end.

Does that help?

[mrz]

arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh! all letters are silent

[CecilyP]

Sorry, EnjoyGold, but that sounds like the most convoluted explanation ever.

[Elibean]

Soft, silent, magic letters. Love it

[flussymummy]

For what it's worth... I really don't understand why on earth little children are ever taught phrases such as "split digraph" at the point where they are learning to read. Surely it's better to make it accessible with phrases such as "magic e" even if it isn't always the case. I found a workbook this week which was attempting to explain "cardinal numbers" and "ordinal numbers" to five year olds. Surely these are phrases for educators and parents to use but not to pass on? There are plenty more useful and interesting things for little people to know about.

[zebedeee]

Red words, green words, tricky words, words with tricky parts, words that will be taught later...

[mrz]

flusstmummy they don't need to be taught any of those phrases ... a simple "this is how we write the sound * in this word" ...
split digraph is technically correct but unnecessary and magic e is cute but inaccurate.
I find the red/green/tricky words equally unnecessary ... "this word has a way of writing the sound * we haven't learnt yet ..."

[mrz]

flussy sorry for my fat fingers

[Rosebud05]

My dd calls it a 'split e' - her school have been using Letters and Sounds.

[Viviennemary]

I wish they would go back to simple stuff. Even I remember from school. Mat add e and you get mate. Fat add e and you get fate, Of course it doesn't always.

[mrz]

Letters and Sounds refers to it as a "split vowel digraph"

[Rosebud05]

OP, I've never explained this to my dd but she just seems to get that sometimes it makes the vowel sound become its letter sound and sometimes it doesn't, so I don't know what to suggest.

Maybe try Googling 'Read, write inc' and see if there's any info there? Otherwise, ask his teacher.