¹“UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), June 2003.”

Phonemic Awareness and Reading

What is phonemic awareness?

The ability to distinguish and manipulate sounds.

What are phonemes?

Phonemes are speech sounds. The word “dog” has three phonemes, one represented by the letter “d,” one by the letter “o” and one by the letter “g.”

Why is it important?

Phonemic awareness leads to reading success.

Reading skills

READING: Use books and poems that contain many rhymes and alliteration (repetition of the first sound in a word).WRITING: Writing experience helps build phonemic awareness. Students begin writing with invented spelling – that is expected and gives insight into how children are connecting with letters and sounds. “Cat” may at first appear as “c,” then “ct” and then “cat.”

GAMES: Children need a variety of opportunities to play with language and increase their awareness of sounds in words and sentences.

• Tapping or clapping can be used to practice segmenting sentences or phrases into component words, words into syllables, and syllables into phonemes.
• Chips or counters can be used to mark the segments.
• Rhyming games encourage awareness of speech sounds.
• Help students to differentiate beginning, middle and end sounds and to manipulate sounds to make new words (mat/bat, back/buck, jam/jab).

SINGING: Songs are another great way to enhance students’ awareness of sounds.

Prompts that can become games to increase children’s phonemic awareness:

• *Drop a Sound: What would be left if the /p/ sound were taken away from pet?
• *Word Matching: Do dog and dinner begin with the same sound?
• *Blending: What word would you have if you put these sounds together /m/, /a/, /t/?
• *Segmenting: What sounds do you hear in the word hot?
• *Phoneme Counting: How many sounds do you hear in the word kite?
• *Odd Word Out: Which word starts with a different sound: big, bike, nine?
• *Sound to Word Matching: Is there a /k/ in the word Mike?
• *Phoneme Switching: What word would you have if I took the /b/ from bit and replaced it with /m/?
• *The Name Game: Man, Man, Bo, Ban etc.

Teaching Letter Sounds

M

Begin by saying, “I’ll touch the letter and say the sound. I’ll keep saying it while I am touching it.”

Demonstrate this and say, “My turn, mmmm.” Hold the sound for two seconds.

Ask your student to say the sound by giving the cue, “What sound?” Listen and slide your finger under the “m” for two seconds as your student makes the sound.

To teach additional sounds, write the previously taught letters on a small board along with the new letter. A magnetic board works well for this too. The board looks like this:

Teach the new letter sound as described above. Check all the previously taught letters, returning to the new letter in between those already taught.

Be sure to model correct sounds when your student’s sounds are incorrect. Say, “My turn, mmmm.” Practice until the sound if correct.

Activities for practicing letter sounds:

• * Use flash cards containing the letters to practice letter/sound correspondence.
• * Fill in a bingo card with letters. Practice the sounds as you play “Letter Bingo.”
• * Use graphic displays that combine the letter form with a picture of something that begins with that letter. Draw the letters within the picture – for example, the letter “B” drawn on a balloon.
• * Make alphabet books with your students. For example, the “C” page will have pictures of cars, cats, cakes, and coins.

Segmenting Words: 1-2-3 Sound Game

Each sound in a word is important. To help your student to read, practice listening for and identifying each sound in a word. You can use pictures or words for segmenting. Phonetic words are an excellent place to start.

Tell your student that you will play a game to break apart all of the sounds he/she hears in a word.

Explain by saying, “When I hold up one finger, you say the first sound of the word. When I hold up two fingers, tell me the next sound. When I hold up three fingers, tell me the last sound.”

“Let me show you how.” Say a word, for example, dog.

• * Hold up one finger and say, “/d/.”
• * Hold up two fingers and say, “/o/.”
• * Hold up three fingers and say, “/g/.”
• * “The sounds in dog are /d/, /o/, /g/.”
• Model this a few times with different decodable words.

“Now you try it.” Say another word, for example, sun.

• * “What are the sounds in sun?”
• * Hold up one finger for /s/.
• * Then hold up two fingers for /u/.
• * Then, hold up three fingers for /n/.
• * Reinforce by saying, “Good. The sounds in sun are /s/, /u/, /n/.”

Do this again with 5-10 words, depending on your student’s level. Keep the pace fast and moving along!

As your student makes progress, use this activity for words with more sounds.

Blending Words

Decodable words are an excellent place to start teaching students how to blend sounds into words.

Point to the word you are blending. For example “am” but do not say the word. Say, “We are going to sound out some words.” Point to the left of the “a,” pause, and say, “Sound.” Quickly move your finger under the “a” and hold it there for about two seconds while the student says, “aaaaa.”

Quickly move on to the “m” and hold it there for another two seconds. The student starts saying, “mmmmm” without any break or pause between “a” and “m.” Say, “Again.” Then point to the left of the “a” a third time, pause, say “Read,” while you quickly move your finger left to right.

If your student makes a mistake say, “My turn,” and model the correct way to blend and read the word. Have your student(s) practice until they correctly blend the word. Do the same thing for other decodable words in a story.

Activities for practicing blending:

* Arm blending: Imagine the sounds of a word lined up along your arm from your shoulder down to your hand. Demonstrate with a word like, “dog.” Say the first sound /d/ as you put your hand on your shoulder, the second sound /o/ as you get to the crook of your arm and the final sound /g/ as you reach your wrist. Then return your hand to your shoulder and say the word “dog” as you slide your hand down your arm. Ask your students to do the same with other words.

*Sound Slide: Draw a slide and place the letters of a word along the slide. Pronounce each letter sound as you slide your hand under each letter. Ask your student(s) to say the word and write it at the bottom of the slide.

Practicing Word Families (Spelling Patterns)

For this example, we are using words in the –it family. There are many word families in English. For beginning students, you will start with simple patterns, such as –ad, -at, or –it.

Encourage your students to point out words in your text that have similar spelling patterns.

Help your students think of other words that have this pattern. You may have to write a few words for him or her:

sit
fit
hit

Ask your student to read the whole word and underline the repeated part of the word: “it.”

Use magnetic letters to form a word with the “it” pattern. Ask the students to change the first letter of the word (for example: “s” in sit) to make a new word such as: “fit.” Provide a limited number of letters (who or three at first) for your student to choose from.

Activities for practicing word families:

Give your student a chance to go back to a book other texts where he or she can apply this new reading skill. Poems, nursery rhymes and jump rope jingles are a great resource for early readers.

Make and use flipbooks to encourage the learning of patterns and rhyme.

Create Wordo games using two different word families. Ask your student to list them at the bottom of the Wordo game.

High Frequency Sight Words

Neither beginning nor advanced readers ever sound out every word. We all have words that we recognize instantly—those are sight words. Your goal for sight words is to start with a words which your student already knows the meaning b.f., and have the student see it and read it instantly—without sounding it out.

What do I need?

Print each word on a flashcard. Print in lower case and use dark pen.

How many words do I work with?

As you work with your students you will develop a sense of how much they can retain in a single session. For students on a low first grade level, start with 3-4 and work up from there.

What are the steps?

When showing a new word, read it first and have your student read it immediately afterward. (Remind your student to look at the word while reading it)

In some cases you may want to make sure your student is thinking of the right sight word. Ask your student to use the word in a sentence to make sure they have the right word.

After you have gone through the flashcards a few times (saying each word and having your student repeat it) then ask your student to read the words. Echo each word and provide correct response, if necessary.

Games to practice sight words:

Put the flashcards up on the table. Ask your student to point to the ones he/she knows and read them. As you student reads each word—he/she turns it face down. When all cards are face down, he/she turns them up one by one and read them.

Use sight words to play Concentration or Wordo.

Once your student knows the words fairly well, turn it into a “high pressure” game by timing your student with your watch. Students generally enjoy trying to beat the clock.

Tips to maximize learning:

Each time the student reads a word, repeat it. Letting your student know he/she read it correctly will strengthen the association of the written word with the spoken word.

When your student hesitates or reads the word incorrectly – give him/her the right word immediately.Don’t make it a struggle – you want to teach instant recognition. Focused word analysis can happen later in your tutorial.

Review frequently!

Keep two envelopes – Words I am Learning and Words I Know. At the end of the session, put them in the “learning” envelope. At the beginning of the next session, show the words – if your student reads them automatically put the words in the “know” envelope. If he/she hesitates or makes a mistake, then re-teach them along with new words for the current session.

First 100 High Frequency Words