Word Chains: What are They & How to Use Them to Practice Phonics Skills

Word chains are a powerful instructional tool to help reinforce sound-symbol (phoneme-grapheme) relationships. Word chaining strengthens both phonics and phonemic awareness skills as students identify the placement of the sound change and the spelling of that change.

What are word chains?

A word chain is a sequence of words that each differ by one phoneme, or sound. To complete the word chain, students build, or write, each of the target words changing one sound at a time. Because the difference is a sound, the spelling may differ by more than one letter. The change can be in any location in the word, making word chaining a phoneme manipulation activity.

What do you need to word chain?

Nothing special! Truly, a word chain can be completed with whatever writing tool you have on hand. With that said, I prefer not to use pencil and paper to do word chains and reserve them for other encoding activities.  My favorite tools for word chains are magnetic letters or letter tiles. I think the visual movement of the letters helps reinforce the changes between words. Dry erase boards and markers also work well as students erase and write the new sound. It may also be beneficial to do word chains using sound boxes, especially for students still in need of phonemic awareness supports. The sound boxes help students connect, or map, phonemes and graphemes helping students’ brains orthographically map the words.

I also recommend having a word list available to you in advance so you don’t waste valuable time trying to find another word that fits within your chain and your targeted skills. Word chains work very well for integrating the specific phonics skill you’re currently teaching. They’re also a great way to incorporate review of previously learned skills. For example, once students are working on long vowel spellings, incorporating short vowels not only gives students ongoing practice with known skills, but also helps students differentiate between the two. Many students struggle with CVC words, for example, once they’re introduced with CVCe words. By practicing with both, students strengthen their understanding of both skills while working to differentiate between them.

How do you do word chains?

Doing word chains with your students is simple. Be consistent in your sequence.

1. Say the first word aloud. Students can repeat the word. It may also be helpful to give a visual or a definition of the word, especially if you have ELL students or it’s not a very common word.
2. Students write the word one sound at a time while saying the sounds. Having students tap out the word before writing may be beneficial depending on students’ abilities.
3. Have students say the written sounds and blend the word to ensure it matches the target word.
4. Say the next word aloud. Students can repeat the word.
5. Students tap out the sounds, identifying which sound is different and writing the new sound.
6. Have students say the written sounds and blend the word to ensure it matches the target word.
7. Continue until the chain is complete.

It’s important to note that you are not telling students which sound to change (for example, change the /p/ in pit to /h/). Instead, you are giving students a complete word and they’re identifying the sound that is different from the initial word. While giving them the sound is often used in assessments to measure students’ abilities, in practice, this makes the skill sign

When should you do word chains?

You can start doing word chains with your students as soon as they know one vowel sound and several consonants. If your sequence begins with SATPIN, you are ready to start chaining once those 6 sounds are introduced. You can do word chains from at, an, in, it, etc. with just words with two sounds and then integrating words with three. If your curriculum follows a different sequence, I’d recommend waiting until you have at least 5 sounds introduced and then layering in the new sounds as they’re learned.

Word chains can be done in both whole group and small group instruction. When done whole group, the nature of only changing one sound at a time helps give supports for students that are not independently proficient with grade level skills. During small group instruction, word chains are a great tool for incorporating both whole class sequence skills while also focusing on where students are independently performing. For example, if you’re working on teaching vowel team sequences, but students are still working on mastering cvc words, most of your instruction can focus on where students are, but the first word can include the long vowel sound.

How does word chaining differ from word building and word ladders?

Typical word building often has students just spelling the word, both with and without sound boxes. While a useful instructional strategy, and one that should be in your arsenal, it’s not the same as word chaining because it’s not focused on phoneme manipulation. Asking students to spell a target word helps them practice sound-symbol relationships as well as phoneme segmentation (and sometimes blending). But without that critical step of changing out the sound, it’s missing that key piece of focusing on minimally contrasted words and identifying differences.

Word chaining differs from word ladders because in chaining both words are given to students. With the knowledge of the two words, in word chains students focus on identifying the sound that is changed and making that change. However, when doing word ladders, students do not know the next target word and use their knowledge of the word and the given clue to identify the new word.