After students master short vowels and CVCE patterns, the next thing they’ll learn are vowel teams. Kids are introduced to vowel teams when they’re ready for them, which is often in 1st grade. Here are all the lists and resources you need to teach vowel team words.
Grab our free printable vowel team word list and cards, then try some of the activities below!
Jump to:
- What is a vowel team?
- Why are vowel teams important?
- Vowel Team Word List
- Vowel teams activities and teaching ideas
What is a vowel team?
A vowel team (also known as vowel digraph or diphthong) is a phoneme (smallest sound in a word) that involves two vowels working together to make one sound. For example, /ai/ in the word “rain” or /ou/ in the word “cloud.”
Diphthong vowel teams are vowel combinations that seem like they should make one sound, but they actually make two. So, there are two vowel sounds in one syllable. Take /oi/. When you say “boy” or “toy,” your mouth moves as you say the /oi/ diphthong because you are saying two sounds instead of one.
Not all vowel teams are the same. There are vowel digraphs and vowel diphthongs. A digraph is when two letters spell one sound (/ai/ and /ea/), and diphthongs are a special kind of vowel sound (/ou/ or /oi/). So, all vowel teams are digraphs, and some are also diphthongs.
Here are all the different types of vowel digraphs:
- Long A Vowel Teams: ai, ay, ea, eigh, ey
- Long E Vowel Teams: ee, ea, ey, ei, ie
- Long I Vowel Teams: ie, igh
- Long O Vowel Teams: oa, oe
- Long U Vowel Teams: ew, ue, eu
- Diphthong Vowel Teams: oi, oy, ou, ow, au, aw, oo
Some vowel teams almost always make the same sound, but some make other sounds as well. For example, “ea” can make the short /e/ sound like bread or the long /e/ sound as in beach.
Read more: What are vowel teams?
Why are vowel teams important?
Simply put, vowel teams are important because students can’t read without them. They’re an important part of understanding how to break words into syllables (separating sailboat into “sail” and “boat” rather than “sa” “il” “bo” “at,” for example). Especially as students get older and are reading more complex words, knowing vowel teams is an important phonics skill.
Watch as one teacher explains how to teach vowel teams:
Read more: What are the syllable types?
Vowel Team Word List
‘ai’ word list
wait, paint, train, gain, chain, braid, snail, grain, plain, aim, fail, aid, laid, raid, bail, fail, hail, jail, mail, pail, quail, rail, sail, tail, wail, flail, trail, main, pain, vain, rain, brain, drain, sprain, strain, praise, bait, gait, waist
‘ay’ word list
day, say, pay, may, nay, ray, way, clay, gray, fray, play, spray, stray, tray
‘ee’ words
need, keep, sheep, queen, speed, sleep, street, sweet, feet, teeth, eel, screen, creep, flee, free, meet, seem, tree, three, speech, green, beef, teem, geese, freeze, coffee, cheese, needle, fleece, asleep, knee, peel, peep
‘ea’ words (long /e/ sound)
teach, please, beach, team, speak, sea, eat, mean, leave, lead, bead, pea, tea
‘ea’ words (short /e/ sound)
deaf, head, dread, health, sweat, spread
‘ew’ word list
few, pew, hewn, crew, grew, stew, flew, chew
‘ie’ word list (long /e/ sound)
chief, shriek, thief, field, brief, shield, grief, piece, niece, yield, fierce, believe
‘ie’ word list (long /i/ sound)
die, tie, pie, lie, tied, tried, spied
‘igh’ word list
high, night, might, fright, sigh, thigh, light, bright, fight, flight, tight, plight
‘oa’ word list
boat, loan, soap, float, groan, roast, throat, oak, bloat, croak, coach, boast, foam, goal, moan, load
‘oe’ word list
doe, foe, toe, woe, hoe, goes, poem, oboe, floe, aloe, toed, tiptoe
‘oi’ word list
join, oil, coin, oink, moist, broil, joint, spoil, soil, foil, hoist, boil, choice, voice, avoid, noisy, rejoin, toilet, turmoil, noise
‘oy’ word list
boy, joy, ploy, toy, ahoy, annoy, cowboy, decoy, deploy, destroy, loyal, oyster, royal, soy, troy, voyage
‘oo’ word list (‘oooh’ sound)
boo, spoon, bloom, room, boost, scoop, droop, moon, tooth, booth, cool, broom, too
‘oo’ word list (‘uh’ sound)
took, book, stood, shook, wood, hoof, crook, brook, good, foot
‘ou’ word list (‘ow’ sound)
house, shout, count, found, loud, pound, ground, mouse, mouth, cloud, grouch, out, couch, pouch
‘ou’ word list (‘uh’ sound)
tough, touch, rough, young
‘ow’ word list (long /o/ sound)
throw, glow, show, slow, grow, snow, blow
‘ow’ word list (‘ow’ sound)
down, town, crowd, growl, cow, howl, brown
‘aw’ word list
saw, claw, draw, paw, yawn, thaw, dawn, awe, awesome, bawl, brawl, scrawl, drawn, fawn, flaw, gnaw, hawk, jaw, law, lawn, pawn, raw, shawl, sprawl
‘au’ word list
launch, vault, fraud, haunt, audio, audit, August, autumn, auction, applause, astronaut, automatic, auto, because, cause, clause, faucet, exhaust, gauze, haul, laundry, pause, sauce, trauma
How To Use the Vowel Team Word Lists and Cards
Like other sounds, these are best taught explicitly. Teach students that two vowels in a team work together to make one sound so they can’t be split up. Two letters, one sound. Especially for struggling readers, teach one team and do not introduce a new one until students have mastered the first.
Visualize Vowel Teams
Have students identify vowel teams by highlighting the teams in a word list or passage. Point out to students that they will see some teams only at the beginning or middle of words, like /ai/, while others are only at the end, like /ay/. Other teams follow the same pattern—/oa/ is only at the beginning or middle of words, /ow/ comes at the end. (But it’s not helpful with other teams like /ee/ and /ea/.)
Use a Sound Wall
Use the cards to create a sound wall or anchor chart to teach students each team and how to read it. Each time you come across a vowel team when reading, have students refer to the sound wall or chart to prompt them for a word that has the sound or to show them how their mouth moves when they make that sound.
Check out: How To Set Up a Sound Wall
Use Elkonin Boxes
Reading vowel teams requires phonemic awareness (like all of reading), so use the lists to choose vowel team words for students to practice segmenting and blending so they can hear the vowel sounds as they learn to read the vowel pairs.
Check out: Elkonin boxes and how to use them
Sound Sort
After students have learned vowel teams, reinforce the skills by having students sort the word cards by each sound. Do this activity before students have learned how to spell each sound, so they can add the knowledge about which letters make each sound to their phonemic awareness skills.
Beach Ball Reading
Choose words from the vowel teams list to write on a beach ball. Have students read the words out loud while tossing the beach ball.
Roll and Read
Write words that have vowel teams in columns on the board and label each column 1 to 6 at the top. Students roll a die and choose a word from the column to read.
Vowel Team Ladders
Vowel team ladders are a great way to practice one vowel team by changing one consonant at a time to make new words. Or for a more advanced ladder, change the vowel team as well. So, turn sail into mail and then main and then moan and so on.
Get Your Free Vowel Team Words Printable
Print copies of the word list and cards to keep on hand for spelling lists and instructional examples, as well as games and activities like the ones described above.
