Year 1 Orientation may be over, but here’s a nano tip that you will find useful when you want to help low-progress learners read better. I felt compelled to share this because I had a student misread “certain” for “curtain”. Other students misread “cell” for “call”.

So, students may not know how to read various high frequency words in your module. Here are examples that I picked up from the orientation:

Facility

Hospitality

Retail

ComCare

electricity

chef

merchandise

community

cell

cucumber

care

circuit

kitchen

kitchen

charge

cheese

current

conductor

Nano tip: When the letter ‘c’ is followed by these letters (a, o, u or anther consonant), it represents the ‘hard’ sound, /k/. Most students know this.

What they don’t know is that when the letter ‘c’ is followed by an ‘e’, ‘i’ & ‘y’, it makes the /s/ sound. This is true at the start of words (city, cent, cycle) and at the end of words (rice).

How to leverage the nano tip?

Mind-mapping is useful both as a memory aid and to help learners visualise the connections between words. I created this mind-map with the Facility Services words because I was once a Science teacher.

Hope this nano tip helps you guide your students read the soft c/hard c words in your module fluently.

Ending this with a fun fact: The takoyaki grill pans in Osaka are made of copper because it conducts heat 5 times better than iron.

Best regards,