3016.9.Resource, UFLI, Virtual Blending Board

This is copied directly from the web site:  "The Virtual Blending Board should be used in most lessons during Step 4: Blending Drill.  The Virtual Blending Board is designed for the teacher to project and manipulate, while students build their decoding automaticity by reading the words the teacher forms. To set up the Virtual Blending Board for a lesson, use the grapheme grid provided in the lesson plan to identify the letters you’ll need.  Then, use the word chain provided to build words for your students to decode.  The tutorial video provides more detailed information for how to set up and use the Virtual Blending Board." It is very important to view the video tutorial first. Please note that although the consonant clusters are included on a single tile on the Virtual Blending Board to allow for a single click to replace the sound(s) in the initial or final position, we do not recommend addressing these clusters as “blends” during instruction. That is, we consider the word “blend” to be a verb—we blend phonemes together—but what is commonly referred to as a “consonant blend” should be treated as two separate phonemes during instruction.  This is one reason we recommend that the teacher manipulates the Virtual Blending Board."