{"id":21901,"date":"2024-03-14T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-03-14T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nwea.org\/blog\/?p=21901"},"modified":"2025-10-29T09:48:28","modified_gmt":"2025-10-29T16:48:28","slug":"6-strategies-for-teaching-multisyllabic-word-reading","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nwea.org\/blog\/2024\/6-strategies-for-teaching-multisyllabic-word-reading\/","title":{"rendered":"6 strategies for teaching multisyllabic word reading"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Many people have been talking about the need for phonics instruction, but most of these conversations come to a screeching halt after talking about instruction in basic decoding skills. Instruction in multisyllabic word reading, or teaching students to read words with more than one syllable, is a crucial bridge between basic phonics and fluent word reading. It is also a major stumbling block for older readers who are still working on foundational reading skills. How to practically teach students to read long words has also been largely left out of the national conversation on the science of reading<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marissa Filderman and Jessica Toste, two university professors who research multisyllabic word reading interventions, joined us to discuss what we know about teaching students to read long words. Marissa is an assistant professor at the University of Alabama and researches literacy interventions for students with and at risk for learning disabilities, with an emphasis on data-based decision-making. Jessica is an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin. She focuses on effective interventions for students with and at risk for reading disabilities, as well as how to intensify interventions through data-based instruction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Misconceptions in multisyllabic reading <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As Marissa and Jessica note, there are several misconceptions about multisyllabic reading and how to approach teaching young children how to read longer, more difficult words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first misconception is that instruction should center primarily on syllables. Marissa recommends not getting too hung up on syllable rules because many of them \u201care very rigid and they don\u2019t always apply.\u201d For example, teaching students to divide a word with a VCV pattern (like pilot<\/em> or travel<\/em>) before the first consonant and pronouncing the first vowel as a long vowel only works about half the time, according to research on the usefulness of syllable division patterns by Devin Kearns<\/a>. \u201cIt can be more confusing for a reader who already has a lot of difficulty with just decoding in general to also think about those rules,\u201d Marissa adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere\u2019s also often a misconception that foundational reading instruction and knowledge of grapheme\u2013phoneme correspondence and decoding skills translate automatically into multisyllabic word reading,\u201d Jessica says. But a young reader having a good grasp of the alphabet and the sounds each letter makes isn\u2019t enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Foundational reading skills<\/a>, including phonics and word recognition, are critical but they are not enough on their own. Jessica explains that kids need to be helped in taking decoding to the next level: \u201cStudents really need to be taught, and students who struggle especially need to be taught\u2014explicitly\u2014how those skills scale up. They\u2019ve been effective for them before. Now how can they use those skills to move from identifying and pronouncing individual letter sounds to identifying and pronouncing word parts to read more complex words? Students need this continued instruction as the words they are being exposed to become more complex and don\u2019t always follow the rules they\u2019ve been practicing in previous instruction.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another misconception is that foundational skills never need revisiting. That may be true for some students, but definitely not all. \u201cThere\u2019s a careful balance we have to find with ongoing foundational skills instruction,\u201d Jessica explains. For some students, \u201cwe need to continue to review vowel patterns and practice flexing vowel sounds while supporting students in decoding multisyllabic words. They need continued practice with those grapheme\u2013phoneme correspondences so that they can apply them fluently and automatically every time they\u2019re reading a word.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, there is sometimes confusion about the role of reading longer texts, as opposed to reading multisyllabic words in isolation. \u201cIt\u2019s important to always read connected text in reading instruction, to always move from isolated word reading to connected text, even if you only have time for a few sentences to read at the end of a lesson,\u201d Jessica advises.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

6 ways to help kids with multisyllabic word reading<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The following six strategies can help you approach multisyllabic word reading with your students:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. Ensure students have prerequisite skills.<\/strong> The first step in approaching multisyllabic words with your students is to confirm they\u2019re ready for the added level of complexity. \u201cMake sure students have prerequisite skills, that they know vowel sounds and consonant sounds, and that they can recognize most grapheme correspondences,\u201d Marissa says.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Focus on affixes. <\/strong>Marissa recommends explicitly teaching the pronunciation and meaning of affixes. \u201cAnd continue to review all the affixes you\u2019ve taught regularly,\u201d she adds. Teaching students to quickly identify and \u201cpeel off\u201d prefixes and suffixes within words can help students begin to recognize both pronunciation and meaning of larger chunks as they encounter more unfamiliar words.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Practice chunking.<\/strong> Because syllable rules can be inconsistent and confusing, Marissa recommends chunking, either by using the vowel in a word or the morpheme. \u201cStudents might use the short or the long form of that vowel sound to read the word,\u201d Marissa says. Teachers can also help students chunk by using morphemes and affixes. \u201cOne of the most important things when focusing on multisyllabic words is really building morphological knowledge through breaking words into meaningful parts to make them easier to read,\u201d Marissa explains. The \u201cpeel off\u201d strategy is useful when chunking, too.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Make a game of reading multisyllabic words.<\/strong> It\u2019s easy for multisyllabic reading instruction to get a little dry, so Marissa recommends getting playful. \u201cAfter having structured practice with assembling and blending word parts to read multisyllabic words, I like to gamify this,\u201d she says. \u201cStudents can play with the words in a sort of game format that\u2019s fun, fast paced, and engaging. [\u2026] Introduce a select number of base words you think might work in your particular instructional context. Have students attach or build onto those base words with prefixes or suffixes. Have them point and say each word part and then blend the word parts and say the whole word.\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  5. Move on to fluency when kids are ready.<\/strong> \u201cFor word reading fluency practice,\u201d Marissa advises, \u201cI like to use targeted word lists until students get really comfortable. I recommend you focus on certain patterns that you want to work with in those word lists, or certain affixes. Your word list can become more complex as you go.\u201d Some of that playful approach she mentioned earlier can work well with fluency, too. \u201cThere can be a timed component of this practice as well, if that\u2019s helpful to students. Or you can have a tracking component where they track their own performance every time they read a word list and see if their fluency is improving over time.\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  6. Practice words in context.<\/strong> Just as Jessica noted, students need time to practice reading more than just isolated words. \u201cJust like with any foundational skills instruction lesson, we always move from reading practice with words in isolation to words in connected text, and doing a lot of practice with connected text,\u201d Marissa says. \u201cThis can look like sentences where the affixes you\u2019re learning appear and multisyllabic words that you\u2019ve been practicing move into passages as well.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Serving students well<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    The crucial bridge for students from basic phonics to fluent word reading often goes overlooked. Consider reaching out to your leaders for any additional support you might need for your students. I recommend the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n