How to help your child read tricky words

Your child will learn to read and spell tricky words during their phonics sessions. You might hear them referred to as something else, such as red words, common exception words or sight words. I like to call them tricky for now words because once we learn the tricky part, they are no longer tricky!

People often think tricky words can't be sounded out and need to be learnt by sight. In fact, tricky words can be sounded, but they aren't easy to decode. This is because they are often irregular or contain a sound that hasn't been taught yet.

How should I teach my child to read them?

If we introduce the word by looking at the sounds your child knows and identify the tricky part, it means there is only a small part of the word that needs to be memorised.

1. Say the word to your child and get them to repeat it.

2. Count how many sounds are in the word e.g. there are two sounds in the word my, m-y. 

Your child will probably have learnt to represent the second sound using the trigraph igh so if you asked them to spell the word they might write migh.

3. Show your child the tricky word card. Point to the sound buttons as you sound out the word e.g. m-y, my.

4. Explain that the part written in black is how we would expect to see it written (m) but the white part might not look how they expected. This is the tricky part that we need to learn by heart. Explain that in this word the igh sound is represented by the letter y.

Resources

Phonics Hub members can download printable flashcards by clicking on the images below or access the digital flashcards here.