In a first-grade activity, several students cannot decode new words when an onset is added to a rime such as -at. The students would most benefit from instruction in which literacy skill?

• A. Phoneme deletion
• B. Blending phonemes
• C. Syllable segmentation
• D. Letter-sound correspondence

Answer: (B)

Blending phonemes is what allows a reader to turn separate sounds into a spoken word. When you see a rime like -at and add different onsets to form words such as cat, hat, sat, the reader must blend the sounds in order to pronounce the whole word correctly. If students can’t decode these new word forms, it usually means they haven’t built up enough skill in blending the individual sounds together smoothly.

Phoneme deletion isn’t capturing the action of building a word from sounds; it’s about removing a sound, which is a different skill. Syllable segmentation focuses on dividing words into syllables, which isn’t necessary for decoding one-syllable words like those that share the -at rime. Letter-sound correspondence matters for mapping letters to sounds, but the specific challenge described—joining sounds to create the word—points to blending as the key skill to strengthen.