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Sam finished his rainy-day book, where the team ai in rain makes one sound. Tonight he has a bedtime book, and he stops at the word light.
Look at light. Which letters team up in the middle?
Trigraphs
Read and spell words containing trigraphs — three-letter graphemes representing a single sound (igh, air, ear, are)
What a learner can do afterwards
- Read words with trigraphs (e.g. 'night', 'chair', 'near')
- Distinguish between different sounds for 'ear' (e.g. 'hear' vs 'bear')
- Identify the single phoneme represented by three letters in a word
1 · Read
You know two letters can make one sound, like 'sh'. Some sounds use three letters instead. That is called a trigraph.
Try it together
Look at chair. The letters a, i, r make one sound: air. Say ch-air.
The letters ear can sound two ways. In hear, ear sounds like eer. In bear, ear sounds like air.
One more trigraph is 'are'. The letters a, r, e make one sound: air. You can hear it in dare and spare.
Good to know
When you see three letters together, try saying them as one sound.
A trigraph is three letters that make one sound, like 'igh' in night or 'air' in chair.
2 · Watch
3 · Play
Take it off screen
Print a worksheetA4 with an answer key page for grown-ups. No screen, no internet.
Where it sits
Learn first
Then practise
24 questions wait behind this lesson, each with its answer explained. Every answer feeds the sky: stars light as they are learned, and dim when it is time to come back.