SyllaSense Inc.

For many years, the importance of teaching handwriting (both printing and cursive) has been downplayed. Printing and cursive writing were removed from most North American curricula because people believed other priorities mattered more, such as exposing students to rich, meaningful text and developing interesting ideas for writing.

Read more of Lee-Ann’s newest blog post, “Does Handwriting Really Matter?” at syllasense.com/blog ✏️

...aaaannnd here are the covers for our latest Teal Set: Teal Square 🩵

This set (and Blue Square) will be available soon, but in the meantime, check out the covers!

📖 Book 1: Big and Small
📖 Book 2: My Kitten, Coco
📖 Book 3: Cake
📖 Book 4: Kites
📖 Book 5: Ropes
📖 Book 6: At the Lodge
📖 Book 7: Music
📖 Book 8: In the Dark
📖 Book 9: Going to a Canyon
📖 Book 10: Sandhill Cranes

Which one are you most excited for? 👀

Introducing our new addition to the Blue Series: Blue Square! 💙🌟📚

This set will be available very soon! In the meantime, check out the covers:

📖 Book 1: So Odd!
📖 Book 2: Try! Try! Try!
📖 Book 3: Sleep
📖 Book 4: The Class Trip
📖 Book 5: At a Glance
📖 Book 6: On the Trail
📖 Book 7: Muskrats
📖 Book 8: Paint
📖 Book 9: Trains
📖 Book 10: Stingrays

Tomorrow, we will reveal the covers for Teal Square! 🩵

Welcome back to school! 🎉📚

To celebrate, we've added a new free resource to our website – Hide and Seek!

This partner game is a fun, low-prep way to build word recognition and review concepts your students have already learned.

How to play:

▪️ Grab a free copy of the editable Hide and Seek game board from our Teacher Resources page (syllasense.com/teacher-resources).
▪️ Edit the board by adding words that include concepts you have already taught that you want your students to practise reading. Use your own words, or use those from the Words & Phrases documents available for each of our series (also available at syllasense.com/teacher-resources).
▪️Print 2 copies of the game board for each pair of students playing. Students will need chips to mark hiding spots and guesses, or you can put the game boards in plastic sleeves so they can use whiteboard markers instead.
▪️Before playing, students each “hide” a predetermined number of words (e.g., 5 or 6) by marking them on the “hide” side of their own game board without showing their opponent.
▪️Partners then “seek” each other's hiding spots by taking turns guessing a word their opponent might be hiding on. To do this, players read a word from the “seek” side of their own game board and wait for confirmation of a find.
▪️Players should mark each guessed word on the “seek” side of their own board. A smiley or checkmark can represent a found hiding spot, and a frown or X can represent each unsuccessful guess.

This game is perfect for word work stations, early finishers, or a quick partner review!

So, what are levelled books anyway?

Levelled books were built on a philosophy: kids learn to read through exposure, not explicit rules. But that meant students had to lean on background knowledge, grammar, and picture cues to get through words they were never actually taught to decode.

In our latest post, we unpack where levelled books came from, why they were so popular, and where they fall apart for kids who don't have that built-in advantage.

Plus: what do we actually do with our book rooms now?

Check out the full post at: www.syllasense.com/what-are-levelled-books

Introducing the SyllaSense Concept Deck!

This free resource includes a card for each grapheme, suffix, and prefix in the SyllaSense Scope and Sequence. The front of each card includes the grapheme or morpheme and the handwriting pathway. Each pathway has a dot to show the entry point and a hashed line with an arrowhead to show the direction to follow when forming letters. The first time each letter is introduced, a letter formation script has been added to the back of the card to help guide students. The back of each card also includes a script for introducing each concept and any additional information about orthographic conventions.

These cards were initially intended to be used by volunteers or parents, but could also be used in classrooms during visual drills, small group instruction, or center activities.

To access this Concept Deck or our Grapheme Deck, please visit: https://syllasense.com/teaching-resources

We're proud to sponsor The 10th Annual Reading League Conference because it brings together a community of educators, researchers, school leaders, and literacy advocates who are united by a shared commitment to improving reading outcomes for every child.

This conference is more than an event: it's an opportunity to learn directly from leading experts, exchange ideas with colleagues from across the country, and explore evidence-aligned practices that make a lasting impact in classrooms. We look forward to being part of these important conversations and hope you'll join us in Chicago, September 30 - October 2.

We'd love to connect with you! Stop by Booth 224 to meet our team and learn more about how we're supporting strong literacy outcomes.

Learn more about the conference: thereadingleague.org/conference



The Reading League

Why Use Decodables?

In our latest post, we dig into what makes a text "decodable," how they support orthographic mapping (the process behind sight words!), tips for using them in small groups, and their limitations when it comes to vocabulary and language comprehension.

🔗 https://syllasense.com/blog/

Turn car rides, waiting rooms, and lineups into learning opportunities with these no-prep phonemic awareness games!

These phonemic awareness game cards build oral language skills that support reading and writing, and require no extra materials.

Grab them digitally or print a hard copy from our Teacher Resources page: https://syllasense.com/teaching-resources/

Thank you, International Dyslexia Association Ontario, for this awesome photo of our booth at this year’s conference. We had such a great time meeting and chatting with you all!

We are thrilled to be back as the presenting sponsor of the 2027 Literacy & Learning Educator Conference. 🎉