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Get 5 free printable worksheets for practicing long vowel sounds. There’s one worksheet for targeted practice of each long vowel sound: long A, long E, long I, Long O, and Long U. Get this engaging, no-prep resource for teaching long vowels and make your instruction fun and meaningful!
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These free worksheets are perfect for kids to practice long vowels. We love them for SO many reasons, and in our honest opinion, these are the BEST free long vowel worksheets out there! Here’s why you’ll love them, too:
They are fun! Who doesn’t love a maze game? Your students won’t even realize they’re working because they’ll be engaged in a meaningful activity, reading to the finish line!
They are challenging. Kids must practice sound discrimination as they read the word and listen for which vowel sound is long. This is an essential, foundational skill for decoding.
Separated by long vowel sound. We organized the worksheets by long vowel sound, so no matter which long vowel you’re working on, you’ll have the right resource to target the skill!
Practice lots of skills together: There are multiple activities on one worksheet, designed to build skills in decoding, fluency, vocabulary, and writing! One worksheet that does it all!
As an added bonus, we specifically included words with various types of long vowels. Words with open syllables, VCe words, and words with vowel teams (sometimes called vowel digraphs) are included.
There are three parts to each worksheet:
1. Sound Discrimination: Beginning at start, students will read the words that connect to the box. They determine which word (only 1) has the long vowel sound, then color it in. They repeat this procedure until they have colored a path from start to finish with only words containing the targeted long vowel sound!
➡️ For more sound discrimination practice, use our 13 FREE sound sorts!
2. Fluency Practice: Kids read all the words in the colored squares, then check the box. Students are required to read all the words a total of 3 times, making sure to listen to make sure they hear the long vowel sound. This is the perfect opportunity for self-monitoring!
3. Vocabulary and Writing: We always want children to connect to meaning and vocabulary. They’ll choose 1-2 words from the maze, then use them to compose a complete sentence. Students will practice using vocabulary words in context while writing with correct usage, grammar, and punctuation!
Did you know there are 8 ways to spell the Long A sound? Visit our post all about Long A to learn best teaching tips and worksheet with 229+ long A words, organized by spelling pattern.
✅ Answer Key: thank, train, day, paint, blade, rain, cake, baby, may, late, a, lake, tail, say, take, Sunday.
There are 8 ways to spell long E, including with letter y! Get more info about teaching Long E and grab a free printable that includes 233+ long E words.
✅ Answer Key: bee, these, feet, baby, hear, very, she, read, began, eat, he, seen, queen, lazy.
There are the six ways to spell Long I! For more teaching tips, and a free word list, visit our popular post all about Long i Vowel sound words.
✅ Answer Key: time, fly, find, fine, spy, hi, I, high, slime, cry, my, buy, ride, five, pine, kite.
Long O can be spelled using five different patterns. To learn more, and get another free word list, check out our Long O post!
✅ Answer Key: no, hello, home, so, yellow, snow, old, road, nose, mope, told, hope, go, over.
Long U makes two sounds: /oo/ like ruler and /yoo/ like unicorn. That’s why there are TWO mazes on this worksheet!
The first sound of long U – /oo/ – can be spelled seven ways, and the second sound of Long U – /yoo/ – can be spelled five ways!
Teachers typically teach the two sounds at the same time, which helps kids learn and discern between the two different sounds, while also understanding that they’re BOTH long u.
We’ve compiled 215+ Long U words and organized them into two lists based on the two sounds of Long U. Read more and grab your Long U sound word lists, too!
✅ Answer Key /oo/: room, too, doing, flew, shoe, into.
✅ Answer Key /yoo/: use, mute, cube, fuse, mule, puke.
👉 The words we include on the worksheets are specifically chosen to represent the most common spelling patterns and most are taken from the 1st grade EDL core vocabulary list (Taylor, et al., 1989).
👉 This resource is best for late first-grade and all second and third grade students who have been introduced to the most common long vowel patterns and high-frequency words.
👉 It’s important that you follow an explicit and systematic scope and sequence when introducing and teaching phonograms. It should introduce vowels in order of difficulty (easiest to hardest) and frequency (most common to least common).
For example, the long vowel a-consonant-e pattern (magic e) is easier and more frequent than the ‘ey’ vowel digraph. According to The ABC’s and All Their Tricks, over 1300 words in English follow the ‘a-consonant-e’ pattern, whereas 18 total words include the ‘ey’ vowel digraph.
We’d love to hear about your experience using this resource!
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