What Is a Vowel Team? Plus, Teaching Tips, Examples, and Activities
Learn the role of vowel teams in reading and spelling, and get helpful examples, tips, and activities for teaching them.
As children learn about vowels, they come to realize these letters and sounds come with many nuances! In addition to long and short vowel sounds, letter combinations known as vowel teams add another dimension to spelling and decoding.
Helping children learn to understand and recognize vowel teams can feel challenging. These explanations, teaching tips, and activities aim to make mastering vowel teams easier and more enjoyable for kids and adults alike!
What Is a Vowel Team?
A vowel team is a combination of letters that together stand for one vowel sound. Usually, this refers to a pair of vowels, such as -ai in rain or -ou in about. Vowel teams can also include consonants, like w in lawn and y in hay. To add to the confusion, one vowel team can stand for different vowel sounds and there can be multiple ways to spell each vowel sound.
Here’s the good news–understanding vowel teams gets easier with time and practice. While kids usually start learning about vowel teams around first grade, they’ll spend several years mastering the many combinations and sounds they can make. That means you can take your time and tackle them slowly, adding in new letter combinations one at a time.
A vowel team is a combination of two or more vowels letters that together stand for one vowel sound.
Vowel Team Types
In general, there are three main types of vowel teams, divided up by the sounds they make. Children don’t necessarily need to learn these types and terms, but adults who are teaching young readers may find it helpful to understand the difference.
Long Vowel Teams
In these teams, two vowels stand for the sound of one long vowel, as in –ea in teach, –ai in train, and –ay in stay. Note that the -ea stands for the long e sound (/ē/), while the -ai stands for the long a (/ā/) sound. Additionally, the vowel team –ay includes the “sometimes vowel” of y.
Short Vowel Teams
As you might guess, in this type of team, two vowels stand for the sound of a single short vowel, as in -ea in bread or -ui in built. These are much less common than long vowel teams and diphthongs.
Diphthong Vowel Teams
In a diphthong vowel team, two letters combine together to stand for a new sound. They’re sometimes called “sliding sounds,” because you slide the two sounds together into one smooth motion to form a new sound.
For instance, in the word soil, the -oi combination doesn’t sound like the letters o or i but instead stands for its own sound. Other diphthongs include combinations like -ou (as in mouth) or -au (as in taut) and -ow (as in cow). Note that the diphthong –ow includes a consonant.
Vowel Teams with Consonants
Some vowel teams are made up of a vowel plus the consonant, as seen in the vowel teams –ow and –ay from above.
You’ll also find vowel teams that include “silent” consonants like -eigh or -igh, as in weigh or high. These are less common and usually taught later, after children have mastered the more common vowel team combinations.
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Vowel Teams and Examples
As noted earlier, some vowel teams can stand for more than one sound, and many vowel sounds can be represented by more than one vowel team spelling. Here’s a general breakdown.
| Vowel Team | Possible Sounds and Example Words |
| -ai | Long /ā/ as in wait, snail, claim |
| -au | Diphthong /ɔː/ as in cause, haul, autumn |
| -aw | Diphthong /ɔː/, as in law, straw, draw |
| -ay | Long /ā/ as in lay, today, may |
| -ea | Long /ā/ as in great, steak, break Long /ē/ as in sneak, feat, clean Short /ě/ as in bread, read, lead |
| -ee | Long /ē/ as in beet, sheet, feel |
| -ei | Long /ē/ as in ceiling |
| -eigh | Long /ā/ as in weigh |
| -eu | Long /ū/ as in Europe |
| -ew | Long /ū/ as in dew, anew, grew |
| -ey | Long /ā/ as in they Long /ē/ as in key |
| -ie | Long /ē/ as in thief, field Long /ī/ as in tie, pie |
| -igh | Long /ī/ as in sigh |
| -oa | Long /ō/ as in foam, boat, coal |
| -oe | Long /ō/ as in toe |
| -oi | Diphthong /ɔɪ/ as in boil, coin, spoil |
| -ou | Diphthong /aʊ/ as in house, out, round |
| -oo | Long /ū/ as in boot, moon, cool Short /ǔ/ as in look, good, foot |
| -ow | Diphthong /aʊ/ as in cow, plow, now Long /ō/ as in throw, blow, snow |
| -oy | Diphthong /ɔɪ/ as in toy, boy, annoy |
| -ue | Long /ū/ as in true, blue, flue |
| -ui | Long /ū/ as in juice, suit, fruit Short /ǐ/ as in built, quilt, guilt |
How to Teach Vowel Teams
Teach Vowel Teams and Sounds One at a Time
At this point, you might be feeling a little overwhelmed by the sheer number of possibilities of vowel team sounds and spellings. Just remember—you don’t need to teach them all at once! You can make the process easier by breaking them into categories and tackling them slowly over time.
Try the suggested teaching order shown here and cover just one vowel team at a time. Mix vowel team activities with other literacy skills, so kids don’t feel bored or overwhelmed. Be patient and take time to make sure your child feels comfortable with each combination.
Start with Predictable, Common, Long Vowel Teams
Begin with the most common vowel teams. Many programs start with –ai, since it only stands for one predictable sound that kids are already familiar with: long a (/ā/). If your child grasps the concept fairly easily, you can also introduce -ay, since this vowel team stands for the same sound. Next, teach the predictable long o vowel teams of -oa and -oe. Finally, learn -ee, which always stands for a long e sound (/ē/).
Tip: For each vowel team, note whether this spelling is more likely to be found at the beginning, middle, or end of a word. This will help kids figure out the right spelling when more than one vowel team is possible. For instance, -oa usually occurs in the beginning or middle of a word (oar, float) while -oe is found at the end (toe, hoe).
Introduce Predictable Diphthong Vowel Teams Next
A diphthong team stands for a whole new sound! While it’s not necessarily important that your child knows the term diphthong, they should recognize the vowel teams that create their own unique sound.
Try this teaching order:
Examples:
- -oi (spoil, join)
- -oy (toy, enjoy)
- -au (applaud, cause)
- -aw (claw, straw)
- -ou (round, house)
Tip: As mentioned above, diphthongs are sometimes called “sliding vowels.” Encourage your child to say these vowel teams slowly, feeling the movement of their jaw as they slide from one vowel to the next. Overemphasize the sounds to make the concept of “sliding vowels” clearer.
Move On to Unpredictable Common Vowel Teams
Now you’re ready to take on unpredictable teams—those that make more than one possible sound. Teach the more common pronunciations first. For instance, -ea is more frequently pronounced with a long e (steal, seam) than with a long a (steak) or short e (bread).
Be sure to acknowledge that this is a tricky concept and accept that your child may find unpredictable vowel teams very challenging at first.
Here are the unpredictable teams to cover, with the more common pronunciation(s) listed first.
- -ea: long e, long a, short e
- -ey: long e, long a
- -ie: long e, long i
- –oo: long u (boot), short u (look)
- -ow: Diphthong (cow), long o (snow)
At this point, learners should also be encouraged to be flexible problem-solvers as they work to read words with vowel teams. If using the long vowel sound doesn’t produce a word they recognize, they should try the next most common sound.
Cover Rare or Unusual Vowel Teams
At this point, you’re left with vowel teams that simply don’t occur as often, though they’re still important to learn.
Teach your child these teams last:
- -ew
- -ui
- -ei
- -ue
- -igh
- -eigh
- -eu
Tip: As with so much of English, vowel teams can have exceptions. For instance, -ew is usually pronounced with a long u (fruit sounds like “froot”), but in the word few, a y sound is added, making it sound like “fyoo.” In the word sew, the same team makes a long o sound. Teach these words as exceptions, in the same way you teach high-frequency words—sometimes they simply have to be memorized when they don’t follow standard rules.
Vowel Teams Activities for Young Readers
Many young readers find vowel teams a challenging concept, and the only way to get better is to practice, practice, practice! Try these vowel team activities to support your child’s literacy journey.
Vowel Sound Activities for Kids
Many vowel sound activities work for both single vowels and vowel teams. Discover a huge collection of play-based vowel activities, like vowel sound bingo and vowel team word ladders.
ABCmouse Vowel Team Practice Worksheets
These printable worksheets are free, fun, and easy to use. From fill-in-the-letter exercises to word-writing activities, your child will get hands-on practice with a wide variety of vowel teams.
ABCmouse Online Vowel Team Games
Our online games are designed by experts to make screen time educational and enjoyable. Explore all our vowel games, including these favorites. Please note that some of these games may require an ABCmouse subscription to play.
Choose the right vowel team for the word represented by each picture, determining between two possible teams that each make the same sound.
Help a family plant their vegetable garden by filling in the missing vowel teams, using context for clues.
As each word appears in the sky, shoot off the correct vowel team firework to fill in the blanks. If you’re right, the sky fills with fireworks!
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