4th-5th Grade Level 8 Sort It /ow/ & Texts PDF

streamlined instruction accelerated achievement

Advanced
PHONICS

Fourth to Fifth Grade
The /ow/ Sound

The “ow” Spelling

Flex It

“The spelling ‘ow’ can be what sound? [/ow/] Did you remember that it can be another sound too?
[/oa/] What will you do when you come to a new word with this spelling if it can be 2 sounds?…
Yes, you could just try one sound and if it doesn’t work, try another one.”
“Let’s read some words that have this same spelling ‘ow.’
Then you can sort the words into 1 of 2 columns—either /oa/ or /ow/.”

✁
✁brown

lo wer

snow

show

flower

a llow

below

crowd

some how

power

plow

window

however

yellow

growth

power

shown

narrow

blown

✁

/oa/

as in go

/ow/

as in cow

✁

cow

✁

slow

Cut out these cards below to
play the sorting game.

The /ow/ Sound
Read the title and examine the pictures on page 4. What do you think this text will be about?
Read to find out why different groups of people have different types of houses.
Finally, search for as many /ow/ sound words as you can and circle them.
But don’t be tricked by spellings that look the same! At the end…

House Creation

Be sure to
summarize
what you
learned!

Imagine that you lived over 500 years ago—before the
creation of cars, iPhones, cranes, or bulldozers. Your
life would look very different from now, wouldn’t it?
How would you protect yourself from the weather?
What would your house look like? Without electric
power or machines, how would you create it?
Long, long ago, Native Americans found many
creative ways to solve the problem of housing:
Some pounded ice into blocks to make igloos
with rounded tops.
Some pressed clay and straw into adobe
bricks and somehow built fancy adobe
apartments in the cliffs of mountains.
Still others moved from place to place
often, so their homes were easy to take
down, move, and then put back up again.
© 2019 Reading Simplified

continued…

As we look across the North American continent,
we can see so many different house types
created by the Native Americans. Why are there
so many differences? What do you think?
1. First, the cli mate—how hot or cold or wet
or dry a land is—led Native Americans to
pick different types of protection from the
weather. For example, if they lived where
the ground was hard and cold, they might
not dig in the earth. Instead, they might
gather snow and pack it into blocks.
2. Second, the materials they could find in
their area led them to create different
types of houses. For example, if they were
surrounded by clay, they might use the clay
to make bricks.
3. Third, the creative ideas of each group of
people were special to them. No two people
are exactly alike, are they?

continued…

Look below and try to guess what type of
climate and materials the Native Americans had
in their area that led them to create these types
of houses.

The “ow” Spelling

Flex & Color It

All of the words hidden in the picture below have the “ow” spelling. If the word has the /ow/ sound,
as in “cow,” color that area with brown pencil or crayon. However, if the word has the /oa/ sound,
as in “coat,” color that area with a yellow pencil or crayon. Other spaces you can color as you like,
perhaps with black, red, or blue.

pillo
w

wer
s ho
ip

ll o

crow

swa

dow
nw
ard

well-known

follower
glow

ing

n
crow

cow

bor
row

cow
boy

slow
er

w
le bo

owne

l
ow

rsh

tow
el

w
plo

er
powd

Read & Search for It

Flex It Check: After reading the famous
rhyme, circle the “ow” spellings. Which
ones are the /oa/ sound and which are
the /ow/ sound?

Little Boy Blue
Little Boy Blue,
Come blow your horn,
The sheep’s in the meadow,
The cow’s in the corn.
But where is the boy
Who looks after the sheep?
He’s under the haystack,
Fast asleep!