LumiraWhat is a spelling pattern?
Some spelling patterns do not fit a tidy category but appear often enough to be worth teaching directly rather than leaving a reader to guess.
war words — word list
Every word below appears in the decodable book on this page, so a reader who practises the list will meet the same words again in context.
- award
- dwarf
- reward
- warm
- warp
- wart
Free decodable book: Decodable WAR
This is an original Lumira decodable reader, written so that a child can sound out nearly every word using patterns they have already been taught. The full text is below — read it here, or open it in the app to read it together with the words highlighting as you speak.
Mia is warm. Leo is warm too. Mia and Leo like a warm day.
Leo got a reward. Mia got a reward too. They like it.
Mia and Leo got an award. It was a big award.
Leo saw a wart. Mia saw a wart too. They like it.
A dwarf did not warp it. Mia and Leo saw the dwarf.
Warm wart dwarf reward warp award. Mia and Leo like them all.
How to teach it
- Say the sound on its own first, several times, before showing any letters.
- Show the spelling and name it explicitly — tell the reader what it says rather than asking them to work it out.
- Blend two or three words from the list together, out loud, slowly.
- Read the decodable book above, where the pattern repeats in real sentences.
- Come back to it two or three days later. Cumulative review is what makes it stick.
Lessons that practise this pattern
war says /wor/
Read war as /wor/
Word sort: war vs wor
Sort war and wor words by their spelling