Syllable Types

A syllable is a word or a part of a word that represents one push of breath.  Breaking words into syllables is an effective strategy for reading multi-syllabic words that may be difficult to sound out otherwise.

Most words can be categorized into one of six syllable types.  Some of the examples below (for example, con and ib) are not real words.  This is because when you break words apart, not all of the smaller parts will be real words (Atlantic = at - lan - tic).  The biggest reason to divide words into syllables is to enable students to determine what sound the vowel will make.

1) CLOSED SYLLABLES:   Examples: con, lip, ib, flash   

• has only one vowel
• ends in a consonant
• has a short vowel sound because the vowel is 'closed in' by the consonant

  2) OPEN SYLLABLES:   Examples: me, I, pre, re

•  ends in a vowel
• has a long vowel sound because the vowel is free to say its name

3) VOWEL-CONSONANT-E SYLLABLES:   Examples: lake, mice, size, type

•  vowel followed by a consonant followed by an e. 
• the 'e' at the end is silent; it "jumps" over the consonant to make the vowel say its name.

4)  DOUBLE VOWELS: Examples: weed, sail, boil, outline

• a syllable that contains two or more vowels.
• sometimes, the vowel team says the long name of the first vowel (weed, sail, boat, toe)
• other times, the vowel team takes on a new, special sound (boil, outline, jaw, joy)
• some vowel teams have more than one sound (ea = eat, steak, weather)

5) R-CONTROLLED SYLLABLES (Bossy "r") Examples: bird, her, car, horn, burn

• contains a vowel followed by 'r'. 
• the r is so 'bossy' that it is hard to hear the vowel
• can include ar, ur, ir, er, or.
• 6) CONSONANT-LE Examples: jumble, sparkle, nimble, sample

• last syllable in a word
• the e is silent
• the consonant sound + the /l/ sound are voiced  

*There are exceptions to each of the syllable types, but most words can be broken down into different combinations of these syllables.