R-controlled syllable

A syllable whose vowel is followed by r. The vowel is neither long nor short, and the r must stay with it.

Syllable rules

Vr SYLL_R_01

Strong rule · High reliability · Very common · Early · Reading and spelling

• /ɑːr/ /ɜːr/ /ɔːr/ r-controlled: car, her, fork

Where Wiggler teaches it: Skill 8: R-Controlled Vowels · Skill 12: Multisyllable Decoding

Child explanation

Car, her and fork all have a vowel with an r after it. The r changes the vowel, so they stay together.

The rule

An r-controlled syllable has a vowel followed by r, and the pair makes a sound that is neither the long nor the short value. Keep the vowel and the r together when dividing.

What is really going on

Naming this type prevents two errors at once: reading car as short a plus r, and splitting gar-den as ga-rden. Both are common in children who know only closed and open syllables.

Position in the word

• One-syllable words — The whole word. For example: car, her, fork, bird, turn.
• Middle of a word — Inside longer words, kept whole. For example: gar-den, mar-ket, per-fect, cir-cle.

Examples

Easy examples

car, her, fork, bird, turn

More examples

farm, start, storm, first, burn, garden, market, perfect, circle, purple, surprise

Pseudo-words

Made-up words that follow the rule. A child who reads these has the pattern rather than the vocabulary.

blar, shern, frurt

Teacher note

Teach immediately after the five r-controlled spellings. The division rule — the r goes with the vowel before it — is what makes garden, market and circus readable, and it is a single sentence.

Learn these first

• AR — ar — The /ɑːr/ of car and farm. Reliable in a stressed syllable — and reliably something else after w, and in an unstressed one.

Related rules

• AR — ar — The /ɑːr/ of car and farm. Reliable in a stressed syllable — and reliably something else after w, and in an unstressed one.
• ER, IR and UR — er / ir / ur — Three spellings, one sound. For reading this is easy; for spelling it is the hardest thing in English, and the difference should be said out loud.
• Syllable division — VC/CV · V/CV · VC/V — Where you split a word decides whether its vowel is long or short. Three patterns cover most of English.
• Decoding a long word — prefix + root + suffix — Peel the affixes first, then divide what is left, then flex the vowels. A four-syllable word is a sequence of one-syllable problems.

• Previous in Syllable rules: Vowel team syllable — CVVC — A syllable whose vowel is spelled with two or more letters. The team is one unit and must not be split.
• Next in Syllable rules: Consonant-le syllable — -ble -dle -tle -ple -kle -gle — The final syllable of little, table, purple and candle. Three letters, one syllable, and the e is silent.
• All reading rules

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