I have a 4th grader that has problems with vowel sounds, especially long “a”.  He can’t say words like pay, bay, lay. Instead he says pie, bye, and lie.  I have tried shaping from long “i” to long “a” but he is not understanding the difference.

Things to Try:

• This sound is made up of the “eh” sound and the “ee” sound.  See if he can say those two sounds individually.  Then, help him transition between one and the other.
• Try to have him say a whole bunch of words that contain the long “a” sound in different contexts and see if any of them sound correct.  If so, use that facilitating context and gradually transition to other words (https://blog.udemy.com/words-with-long-a-sound/).