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Letterland Literacy Program
By: Jenna Sexton
Tonya Denny
History
• Lyn Wendon - originator of the
pictogram system on which
Letterland is based.
• Lyn is a well-known reading
specialist who lectures to
schools and teachers.
• She has a degree in languages
from Wellesley College in
Massachusetts.
• Devised Letterland as a remedy
for reading failure. She saw that
a style of teaching was needed
to explain letter behavior and
fired imaginations.
What is Letterland?
Letterland is a fully multi-sensory program:
• Letterland pictograms provide strong visual
mnemonics for letter behavior.
• Auditory learning is stimulated by song,
rhyme, alliteration and storytelling.
• Kinesthetic learners benefit from action
songs, role play and crafts.
• Children interact with the Letterland
characters, activating intrapersonal and
interpersonal relationships.
Goals & Objectives
*The goal of the Letterland Literacy
Program is to provide a “realistic parallel
world” bridging the gap for abstract
print.
*This program provides a secure learning
environment where children can happily
develop cognitive, language and
literacy skills which include:
* Phonemic Awareness
* Alliteration & Symbol/Sound Links
* Letter Formation
* Blending & Segmenting
* Word & Sentence Building
* Vocabulary & Language
* Imaginative Play & Creative Writing “
Early Years Phonic Patterns
•Phonemic
awareness
LETTERLAND
CHARACTER
S
LETTER
SHAPES &
SOUNDS a-z
•A-Z and a-z
shapes and
sounds
CAPITALS A - Z
•Language
development
LONG
VOWELS
a-z
a,e,i,o,u
Primary Years Phonic Patterns
•Alphabet proficiency
FAST TRACK
•Word building
BEGINNINGS,
MIDDLES & ENDINGS
•Onsets & rimes
CONSONANT
BLENDS
DIGRAPHS
a-z
a, e, i, o, u
sh, th, ch
-nk, -ng
-ff, -ll, -ss
bl, cl, fl, gl, pl, sl,
br, cr, dr, fr, gr, pr, tr,
sc, sk, sp, st, sm, sn, sw,
scr, spl, spr, squ, str,
shr, thr
•Beginnings, middles
and endings
LONG VOWELS
a-e, ai, ay,
e-e, ee, ea,
i-e, ie, y, igh,
o-e, oa, o¯w,
u-e, o¯o, ew, ue,
•Blends & digraphs
VOWEL DIGRAPHS
ar, or, ow, ou,
oy, oi, er, ur, ir,
oo, u, aw, au
•Advanced spelling
TRIGRAPHS AND
ADVANCED
PHONEMES
air, ear
Advanced Phonic Patterns
•Word building
•Advanced
spelling
patterns
•Irregular
vowels, more
digraphs and
trigraphs
a (as in America/father)
all/al (as in all/always)
are (as in scare)
al/el (as in
musical/angel)
ce/ci/cy (soft c stories)
ch (as in school)
ed/ing (Magic sounds)
e (Silent letter)
e (as in they)
ea (as in head)
ear (as in bear)
ei (in
receive/height/eight)
en/est (Magic endings)
er (Sometimes Magic)
ere (in here/there/where)
ey (as in donkey)
full/ful (as in useful)
dge/ge/gi/gy (soft g
stories)
gh (as in bought/laugh)
ie (as in lie/field)
k (the ‘k’ sound)
kn (as in knee)
le (as in table)
able/ible (suffixes)
ly (as in lovely)
less/ness (suffixes)
mb/mn (as in
thumb/Autumn)
o (as in love/one/who)
ous (as in famous)
ph (as in photograph)
que (as in antique)
tion (as in action)
ture (as in picture)
wh (as in when/who)
wr (as in write)
y (as in very/bicycle)
y to i (as in cry/cries)
y (Sometimes Magic)
Letterland Kit Products
Letterland Kit Products
Grade Kits
• Kindergarten: Teacher’s Guide,
student reproducible workbooks, CDs,
Onset& Rimes Flipchart Book, Phonics
Chart, Letterland Character Story
Books, Flashcards, videos, Puzzles, Big
Books, Magnets, and Frieze
• 1st Grade: Letter cards, Posters,
Puzzles, Teacher’s Guide,
Reproducible workbooks, CDs,
Alphabet frieze
• 2nd Grade: Teacher’s Guide, Letter
cards, video, workbook, literature
books based on the characters, and
sing-along CDs.
Kindergarten: What teachers
like/dislike about Letterland
•
•
•
•
•
•
Likes
Captures students’ attention
Stories help students’ learn new
concepts
Students’ are excited about the stories
and characters
Students’ use their imagination to
venture into an imaginary world
Dislikes
Students’ become too dependent on
the characters
Program is not focused enough on the
letter sounds
First Grade: What teachers
like/dislike about Letterland
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Likes
Students love it
Gives the students a memory-link that they
need
Fun phonics
Colorful
Easy lessons
Dislikes
Doesn’t provide all the phonemic
awareness needed for 1st grade
Students’ become dependent upon the
characters (often do not carry the phonics
knowledge over to decode and encode)
The program is harder to incorporate over
into the aspects of other literacy programs
(Rigby, Basal, Open Court)
Second Grade: What teachers
like/dislike about Letterland
Likes
• High quality materials and the
stories that explain why various
combinations make specific
sounds when put together
• Stories and materials
Dislikes
• Picture-coding becomes
cumbersome and in some ways
unnecessary by the 2nd grade
level
Exceptional Children’s, Reading Specialist
and Resource: What teachers like/dislike
about Letterland.
•
•
•
•
•
•
Likes
Captures students’ attention
Students learn new concepts
Students learn the sounds
Dislikes
Students are too dependent on the
characters
Program does not focus enough on
letter name and lacks a strong
reading program that connects using
letter sounds to read words
No leveled books to coincide
Surveyed Teachers were ask: Does Letterland meet the
North Carolina Standard Course of Study?
“Yes, it helps teach children how to learn the sounds of each
individual letter and how to blend those sounds to make
words.” (T. Kearley, 2006)
Kindergarten
1.02 Develop phonemic awareness and knowledge of
alphabetic principle:
• demonstrate understanding that spoken language is a
sequence of identifiable speech sounds.
• demonstrate understanding that the sequence of letters in
the written word represents the sequence of sounds in the
spoken word.
• demonstrate understanding of the sounds of letters and
understanding that words begin and end alike (onsets and
rimes).
1.03 Demonstrate decoding and word recognition strategies
and skills:
• recognize and name upper and lower case letters of the
alphabet.
• recognize some words by sight including a few common
words, own name, and environmental print such as signs,
labels, and trademarks.
• recognize most beginning consonant letter-sound
associations in one syllable words.
Surveyed Teachers were ask: Does Letterland meet the
North Carolina Standard Course of Study?
“Yes. The children learn the letter sounds and
relationship with one another.” (D. Hess,
2006)
“This program helps children make
connections between the letters and
sounds..” (C. Mock, 2006)
First Grade:
1.02 Demonstrate decoding and word
recognition strategies and skills:
• generate the sounds from all the letters
and appropriate letter patterns which
should include consonant blends and long
and short vowel patterns.
• use phonics knowledge of sound-letter
relationships to decode regular onesyllable words when reading words and
text.
“Letterland, alone, does not. I see it as a part,
albeit even a small part, of my whole
literacy program. (M. Wright, 2006)
Does Letterland meet the North Carolina Standard
Course of Study?
“Yes, it helps with the phonics-related
objectives and goals by stressing
various letter/sound combinations
and giving students “tricks” to help
them remember the sounds.” (A.
Weaver, 2006)
“Yes. It uses characterization and stories
to help students remember the sounds
made that certain letters use
together.” (S. Johnson, 2006)
2nd Grade
1.03 Self-monitor decoding by using
letter-sound knowledge of all
consonants and vowels.
Does Letterland meet the North Carolina Standard
Course of Study?
“Yes! Letterland aides students in
connecting the grapheme –
phoneme connection.” (C.
Wells, 2006)
Mrs. Wells is a Exceptional
Children’s Teacher at Blue
Ridge Elementary
See NCDPI link below for areas of
exceptionality:
http://www.ncpublicschools.org/
ec/exceptionality/
Special Needs Students
Letterland has been used in Special
Needs environments to aid early
literacy development in children
with a range of complex
conditions, such as:
• Dyslexia
• Autism
• Dyspraxia
• Cerebral Palsy
• Apraxia
• Down's Syndrome
• Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD)
• Speech and Language
Disabilities
Official Opinions of the Program
Bob Schlagal, Ph.D., Professor of Reading, Graduate Faculty
and Senior Clinician, Appalachian State University
“Letterland is the most effective of all the synthetic phonics
programs for children that I have observed or worked with.
This program is not only extremely well-thought out, it is
highly imaginative and distinctly and usefully
memorable. As a result, teachers and children alike take
pleasure in carefully exploring the terrain in which letters
and groups of letters live and interact. As a long term student
of young children’s writing and spelling development, I have
been singularly impressed at the early start that children get
with the aid of Letterland instruction. (This is something that
teachers comment on with regularity.) I have consistently
observed earlier, more accurate and more complete
phonemic analysis in children’s spelling under this system—
Letterland’s dramatic “live spelling” may be a powerful help
in this--as well as a willingness to write among even the
most shy and least secure children. Although I have focused
my comments on children’s writing, I see the same kind of
excitement and progress in their reading”.
Official Opinions of the Program
Rebecca H. Felton, Ph.D. Reading
Consultant, Author, Dyslexia Researcher
and former Faculty member,
Neuropsychology Department, Bowman
Gray School of Medicine
"Many children who are at risk for reading
difficulties have serious problems
learning the names and sounds for the
letters of the alphabet. Letterland, with
its engaging characters, stories, songs,
gestures for each letter, provides a rich
and effective system of cues for lettersound associations. Use of these
multiple cues as part of the Letterland
reading program should ensure that all
students develop mastery in this critical
component of reading."
Bibliography
Letterland International Ltd.
(2006). Retrieved March 6,
2006, from
http://www.letterland.com
/index.html
Wendon, L. (2006). Letterland
Teacher’s Guide. UK:
Letterland International
Ltd.
Bibliography
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of
Annabel Bennett, Kindergarten Teacher at
Blue Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of Casey
Bowen, Literacy Specialist at Blue Ridge
Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of Debra
Buchanan, First Grade Teacher at Blue
Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of
Deborah Hess, First Grade Teacher at Blue
Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of
Amanda Hipp, Resource Teacher (1-3)at
Blue Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of Sheila
Johnson, Second Grade Teacher at Blue
Ridge Elementary School].
Bibliography
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of
Tamara Kearley, Kindergarten Teacher at
Blue Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of Jada
Mast, Kindergarten Teacher at Blue Ridge
Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of
Carolyn Mock, First/Second Grades
Teacher at Blue Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of Allison
Weaver, Second Grade Teacher at Blue
Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of Cindy
Wells, Exceptional Children’s Teacher at
Blue Ridge Elementary School].
Denny, T. & Sexton, J. (2006). [Survey of
Martha Anne Wright, First Grade Teacher
at Blue Ridge Elementary School].