Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness

 

What is it? 

Phonemic awareness is the capability to recognize, think about, and manipulate separate sounds in spoken words. This includes the ability to change words as well as blending sounds and stretching out the sounds. 

For example.....

  • Noticing words in a set that begin with the same initial sound
    • "Dog, door, dug, & dip, all have /d/ at the beginning of the word"
  • ​​​​​​​Separating the inital or last sounds in a word
    • ​​​​​​​"Beginning sound of sang is /s/; ending sound of sang is /g/."
  • ​​​​​​​Blending and connecting separate sounds to create a word
    • ​​​​​​​"/d/, /o/, /g/ --- dog"
  • ​​​​​​​Articulating individual sounds in a word
    • ​​​​​​​"cat --- /c/, /a/, /t/"

What does research say? (AKA...why is it important???)

  1. ​​​​​​​Crucial to learning and practicing the alphabetic code
  2. Infers ensuing results in reading/spelling
  3. Students who poor readers normally have difficulty with phoneme awareness and become easily frustrated. 
  4. Students who are advanced readers (and spellers) typically benefit from extra phoneme awareness instruction

Strategies? 

  • Simple Phonemic Awareness

    • ​​​​​​​Isolated Sound Recognition
      • ​​​​​​​Teacher makes a connection from a phoneme to a creature or action. (Ex: /s/ with the hissing sound of a snake)
    • Word, Syllable and Phoneme Counting
      • ​​​​​​​Teacher reads sentences aloud to student without them seeing it, and student will place a marker (left to right) for each word heard. Teacher can confirm words by showing student printed version. Student can clap or tap on desk to figure out number of syllables.
    • Sound-to-Word Matching
      • ​​​​​​​Teachers provides students with a visual of a dog and asks “Is there an /mmm/-og, a /d/d/d/-og or an /sss/-og?”

  • Compound Phonemic Awareness

    • ​​​​​​​Word-to-Word Matching
      • ​​​​​​​Teacher uses games such as dominoes or cards to help students determine if two or more words start with the same initial sound. 
    • Sound Deletion 
      • ​​​​​​​Teacher shows students picrures of objects that are compound words or points to objects in the classroom that are compound words. Teacher demonstrates for student how each word can be stated without its missing part. 

 

Resource Video

Reading Interventions: Mastering Short Vowels and Reading Whole Words

 

 

 

References

https://www.readingrockets.org/article/why-phonological-awareness-important-reading-and-spelling#:~:text=Why%20Phonological%20Awareness%20Is%20Important%20for%20Reading%20and%20Spelling,-By%3A%20Louisa%20Moats&text=Phonological%20awareness%20is%20critical%20for,poor%20reading%20and%20spelling%20development. 

 

https://online.seu.edu/articles/phonemic-awareness-strategies-for-building-literacy-skills/