PHONOLOGICAL AWARENESS & PHONEMIC AWARENESS

Phonological awareness is a large term for the awareness of the sound parts of language including words, syllables, onsets and rimes as well as the smallest parts-phonemes.

Words: auditory discrimination of words within sentences. EX: word counting. Orally state a sentence and count how many words you hear in that sentence. Skills to learn: sentence segmentation, blending, segmentation, deletion.

Syllables: auditory discrimination of syllables in words. EX: syllable counting. Orally state a multiple syllable word and count how many syllables you hear in that word. Skills to learn: blending, segmentation, deletion.

On-set rime: auditory discrimination of the first sound(s) of a word (on-set) broken off the end part (from the vowel to the end of the word) (rime). EX. segment onset-rime. Orally state the word chat. Orally break the onset ch from rime at. Using a visual aid helps like a marker with a lid. Skills to learn: recognize rhyme, generate rhyme, categorization, blending, segmentation..

Phoneme: auditory discrimination of the smallest unit of sound in language (phoneme) and being able to manipulate these sounds. Ex. blending. Orally state all the sounds of a word and have the students blend those sounds together and say the whole word. Skills to learn within phonemic awareness: isolation, identity, categorization, blending, segmentation, deletion, addition, substitution.

Phonemic awareness is the awareness of phonemes, those smallest sound parts of our language, and the ability to manipulate, segment, blend, delete, add sounds, and generate rhymes.

Phonemic awareness is one of the most critical phonological awareness skills children can acquire. When students are proficient in phonemic awareness, they are more likely to become skilled readers.

Phonological awareness is one of the few factors that teachers are able to influence significantly. Phonemic awareness performance is a strong predictor of long-term reading and spelling success and is one of the best predictors of literacy achievement. It is considered to be the strongest single determinant of later reading achievement. Phonemic awareness can significantly accelerate students’ reading and writing achievement (Ball & Blachman, 1991).

Phonemic Awareness is taught through oral interaction with language SOUNDS while: segmenting, blending, deleting, adding, manipulating sounds, and generating rhymes. All these skills are done orally with the sounds of our language.

Phonemic awareness is best done prior to a phonics lesson but can also be done in isolation in small lessons in kindergarten.

Integrating Oral Language into Phonological Awareness is important to allow students the opportunity to say the various sounds of our language out loud. Students can chorally repeat, chorally respond, respond to a buddy, or whisper respond with any phonological skill to improve their phonological abilities.