Phonemic Awareness

A phoneme is the smallest unit of speech in the English language.  For example the sound /sh/ is one phoneme, even though it has two letters that make up that sound.  /b/ is also a phoneme, as is /p/ or /ch/.

Phonemes are important because they help us distinguish between words like bit and pit.  When children are learning to read, phonemes are important because we need to listen for the different sounds in words in order to be able to spell them, and we need to be able to pronounce them.  The difference between pin and pit is only one sound, but that one sound can tell us exactly what the other person is thinking.

When children are developing their ability to hear phonemes in words, they typically can hear the first sound in each word.  After that, they are able to hear the last sound in words.  If a child at this stage of development is writing a sentence like "My dog went on a walk."  The sentence might look some thing like "mi dg wet n a wk."    Finally, children are able to hear the medial or middle sounds in each word.  In my work with 3-6 year olds, at this point in the year almost all of the kindergartners can hear beginning and ending sounds in words.  By the end of this school year they'll be able to hear medial sounds as well.

Some games you can play with phonemes:

• Again, play "I Spy".  Find beginning sounds in objects in the room.  Then do ending sounds in the room when you think your child is ready.
• Use pictures in books and find things that either start with a certain sound,  or end with a certain sound.  
• "What's the last sound you hear in the word _______________?"
• Give your child words and ask her if they sound the same.  "Do bat and bat sound the same?"  "
• "Do bat and car sound the same?"  
• "Do bat and bag sound the same?"
• "Do big and banana have the same beginning sounds?"
• "Do clip and clutch have the same beginning sounds?"
• "Do Mike and rake have the same sound at the end?"
• "Is there a /v/ in van?"
• "Where is the sound /w/ in went?"
• "Where is the sound /f/ in laugh?"
• "Where is hte sound /a/ in hat?"

Always remember that these games are for having fun.  :)  

Phonological Awareness vs. Phonemic Awareness

One of the things some dyslexic children have difficulty with is playing with the words in sounds.

Phonological awareness is the umbrella term for playing with words and parts of words, for example, rhyming words like cat, fat, bat, sat, etc.  It involves being able to separate sentences into words, words into syllables, and syllables into their individual sounds.  

Phonemic awareness is the ability to hear and manipulate those individual sounds in syllables and words.  For example, being able to hear the first sound in the word hat as /h/.  It is an understanding that words are made up of individual sounds and the ability to manipulate those sounds.

Why is this important?  A child who can manipulate the sounds in a word can easily read the word bat, if she can also read the word hat.  Her brain can make those substitutions easily and form the new word by drawing upon what she already knows.

The typical progression for phonemic awareness is that children are able to pick out the first sound in a word first, then the final sound, and lastly the medial or middle sound.  Conversely, when children begin writing, their very early writing will be a string of consonants that may include only the first sound in the word, and then progress to the first and last sounds in some words.  Hopefully I'll have some samples of children's work to show you as the year progresses.

One of the games we play in a Montessori environment is called "I Spy" and it's purpose is phonemic awareness.  We have a basket of objects that we lay out on the table or rug and we name them as we lay them out.  Initially we'll start with 2 or 3 objects only.   There might be a hat, a ball, and a mouse.  Then we'll say, "I spy with my little eye, something that starts with the sound /m/."  It would be the child's work to pick the mouse.

I'm often told by parents that their child "knows all of the letters" and indeed that child does.  But, what that child is lacking typically is the abilitiy to play with the sounds associated with the letters or even to know the sounds associated with those letters.  If we can start children when they're young and help them get some solid phonemic and phonolgical awareness skills, we'll be helping them become much better readers in the long run.