TAPPING OUT WITH TiLES

  This year my principal purchased a systematic phonics program called Tapping Out With Tiles.  Her niece had been in the author's classroom the previous year and we were amazed at her reading, writing, and spelling.
   Remember that this is a copyrighted program but I wanted to brag about how well my students are doing with this program. It's actually based on speech therapy.  The big board that the teacher has displayed and the posters that the students have on their desks have consonants on the side and vowels in the middle.  Each spot is labeled for a specific tile.  The red tiles are the consonants.  The yellow tiles are the vowels because they light the way to reading.  You can't read without light.  You keep reminding the students that words must have vowels. The set up this in the beginning is a lot since you have to laminate the teacher tiles and add velcro. Then you have to buy the plastic tiles and write the letters for all the students.  That means you are writing 24 a's for a lesson but we just sit around and chat while we do the next week.  Next year it will be a breeze.
   The letters are introduced slowly.  Usually there are 2 letters introduced.  The letters have a name based on the student's mouth position.  For example p and b are called Pushers because you push out the sounds.  The program even distinguishes between voiced letters that have the Adam's apple vibrating like b and the voiceless letters like p which have air coming out. Keep in mind, I am teaching first grade and they are calling letters pushers and distinguishing between voiced and voiceless. 
  Then comes the meat of the program.  The teacher says echo the word such as sat.  The students echo the word sat.  Then the teacher says fingers up and tappers together.  So the students all put up their hands with their finger pointing to the ceiling.  Tappers together means that the students have their thumb touch their pointer (index) finger.
  Now for the tapping out.  The students tap out the word sat by tapping their index with their thumb and saying /s/.  Then they put their tall finger with their thumb and say /a/. Finally they put their thumb with their ring finger and say /t/.  Now they move their letters to the bottom of the chart called the spelling area as they sound out (tap out) the word. Repeat one more time and ask them to say the word.
   Next you talk about the word and ask to put it in the sentence.  Finally, you write on the word on the whiteboard and Mark it.  For example, sat you will write a curved line and call it a breve.  Students in first grade are using a breve and telling you it is for a short vowel sound.  Pretty impressive.
   Interesting enough after doing a few short vowel sounds, they move to silent e to make long a and long o.  Next they start working on blends.  I'm amazed at how well they do, as they explain that the silent e has magic and can go through one letter.  It pokes the letter and says Mr. A, Mr. A...say your name. AAAA!
   I'll keep you posted on this systematic phonics program based on speech sounds and mouth patterns.  I love the making words with tiles every day.  It is REALLY helping my low students. If you are interested in Tapping Out with Tiles I can send you the author's information since I think that they are still selling it themselves.  I can't copy any of it because of copyright laws but I've heard how moving your hand on your arm has helped struggling readers so I can see why tapping on fingers would really help since it segments the words.  We will keep tapping in first grade...with our fingers and not our toes.