Lesson Organization: The phonics lessons contain a mixture of daily and weekly activities.

Children engage in a daily alphabet activity. (In Saxon Phonics and Spelling K the alphabet is practiced in more than three fourths of the lessons.) Throughout the year children recite the alphabet and play games to learn how to recognize and sequence letters. In Saxon Phonics and Spelling 2, children also develop dictionary skills and may study the history of the English alphabet as an enrichment activity.

Each child receives a laminated alphabet handwriting strip displaying two different handwriting styles: the Saxon block-style alphabet on one side, and a D'Nealian-style print (Saxon Phonics and Spelling K and 1) or cursive (Saxon Phonics and Spelling 2) alphabet on the other. The strips also contain tiny right and left hands for children's reference and small, colorful illustrations that match the picture and wall cards and provide mnemonics for the letter sounds.

Saxon Phonics and Spelling 1 and 2 use the Alphabet/Accent Deck to practice accenting without the added task of sounding out new words. The cards employ small alphabet sequences and thus serve the additional purpose of reinforcing the alphabet order.

To benefit from the instructional content in this program, children must have attained a level of conceptual development called phonemic awareness. Phonemic awareness is both the awareness that words are composed of separate sounds and the ability to hear and manipulate those sounds. Phonemic awareness is explicitly taught every day in Saxon Phonics and Spelling K and during the first seventy lessons of Saxon Phonics and Spelling 1. It is embedded in the remaining Saxon Phonics and Spelling 1 lessons and throughout the Saxon Phonics and Spelling 2 program.

Letter, picture, sight word, affix, and spelling cards form the Review Decks, which are practiced daily and provide repeated exposure to previously learned concepts to ensure mastery.

Spelling is an integral part of each program and is practiced daily. Spelling instruction always reinforces the phonics concepts taught. During the Spelling Review, children spell sounds given by the teacher, play games to practice recognizing those sounds, practice spelling sight words and high-frequency words, and (in Saxon Phonics and Spelling 2) write sentences from dictation. To aid teachers in the pronunciation of letter sounds, an audiocassette tape is provided with each kit.

Each day a letter, letter cluster, spelling rule, or other phonics concept is taught and/or reinforced using multisensory techniques. Once a concept is introduced, it is continually reviewed and practiced in subsequent lessons.

The boardwork activity is designed to prepare children to complete their worksheets by participating in a class discussion and review of concepts taught. Children assist as teachers or volunteers from the class code and read selected words, phrases, and sentences on the board; this exercise reviews concepts that will appear on that day's worksheet. Boardwork occurs frequently in the later Saxon Phonics and Spelling K lessons and daily in Saxon Phonics and Spelling 1 and 2.

Worksheets provide an opportunity for children to apply what they have learned and for teachers to track children's progress on a daily basis. Saxon Phonics and Spelling K worksheets are completed with teacher assistance. In Saxon Phonics and Spelling 1 and 2, one side is completed in class and the other side is finished later in the day or as homework. Most worksheets in Saxon Phonics and Spelling K and 1 feature a short list of high-frequency words to be read and practiced at home in order to build reading fluency. In Saxon Phonics and Spelling 2, this list appears on the Spelling and High Frequency Word Practice, a separate worksheet used during daily Spelling Review activities.

Any homework, completed worksheets, copies of assessments, and decodable readers from the day's lesson are sent home so that children may continue to practice and their families may participate in the learning experience. Individual homework folders help organize children's materials for transport between school and home. Pocketed Saxon Homework Folders, labeled with information that will be taught throughout the year, are available for separate purchase.