This is a vowel team icon. The vowel team icon reminds us to look for patterns where two vowels next to each other work together to make one sound.

When two vowels sit together and make one sound, keep them in the same syllable. Dividing the consonants between vowel teams and other vowels is more forgiving, as it usually won’t change the vowel team’s sound. 

• First, circle any suffixes and look to see if it is a compound word. If it is a compound word, spell each word separately.  
• If there is one consonant after the vowel team, divide after the vowel team, as in freedom → free / dom. 

If the vowel team is followed by a consonant L E, keep the consonant L E in its own syllabel at the end, as in beetle → bee / tle.