Tuesday, 3 March 2015

Words of the Week

We have arrived at our final sound rule for this year! Rather than focusing on a sound that some letters create, we are focusing on a sound that is not created. Two months ago, we learned about the sound ‘en’. However, when an action word ends with ‘-ent’, the nt is SILENT! This will occur all the time in the 3rd person plural of most verbs. Pronouncing the ‘-ent’ is one of the most common reading errors made by French immersion students, even in the junior grades. This is a hard rule to explain, and I haven’t gone into conjugating with our grade 1s. I’m explaining that we need to think about whether the word is an action (something we do) and if so, we ignore the ‘nt’. To my delight, we are starting to get it! Have your reader go through their list and put an X over all the silent letters.
Quick review:
Les    parents   travaillent.
                       (not an action word - normal )                        ( action - ignore)

Words: les oiseaux chantent, 
les grenouilles sautent, 
les enfants parlent, 
les chiens courent, 
les chats dorment, 
les amis jouent, 
les parents travaillent, 
les feuilles tombent, 
les avions volent
Bonus words: ils peuvent, elles aiment

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