Oh, the simplicity of Souns! This is the progress sheet for a classroom or number of students from initial introduction of Souns through decoding. If you are a teacher, a glance at this sheet (if you record data regularly) will give you the information needed to re-group your children according to ability. This should be done often to sustain a dynamic learning environment.

It is important to record information or activities mastered. Souns is such a simple, fun, hands-on way to build little readers – in their time!

The classroom tracking sheet ensures classroom management. Responsible use of this tool is one of the few critical requirements of this program. After each group lesson, record any updates via the legend for each child.

Proper use of this sheet includes following the Souns sequence of letters, even when compelled to do otherwise. This order has been developed with much guidance and has been scrutinized by speech/language pathologists. There is nothing arbitrary or happenstance about the Souns program, including the order of introduction.

ONLY as a sound is mastered may you add one new sound. That means there will not be more than 4 letter-sounds being learned by a child at one time. Do not, however, stop including the sounds mastered by the child in future lessons. In this way, the child will work across the row of the tracking sheet and through the digraphs, starting with o/m/s/t and adding one new sound for each one mastered. Digraphs will be specific to the language being taught.

With this classroom overview, using the same legend as on the individual tracking sheet for each student, you can group and re-group the learners as they progress through letter-sound associations. Children should be re-grouped regularly according to their abilities. This will keep the groups and the entire classroom more dynamic and will cross-fertilize the environment with a variety of letter-sounds.

This classroom tracking sheet helps you re-organize at a glance. Legend:

Not Introduced Yet

Introduced

Knows = Learner can find or touch without error when asked for specific sound.

Mastered = Learner volunteers the sound for a letter without being asked (from print in the classroom or as the letters are being taken out of a container for a lesson).

For each Mastered sound, the child is introduced to the next new sound in the Souns sequence of letters.