Phonemic Awareness

What is Phonemic Awareness?

Phonological awareness is an umbrella term that encompasses both basic levels of awareness of speech sounds, such as rhyming, alliteration, the number of words in a sentence, and the syllables within words, as well as more advanced levels of awareness such as onset-rime awareness and full phonemic awareness.

Fun with Phonological Awareness

Try these activities at home to help your child to practice phonological awareness skills:

  • Clap It Out! Practice clapping the syllables in words, such as 'wat-er-mel-on'

  • Guess My Word! I'm thinking of a word that is 'clap' without the 'c'

  • Rhyme Time! Practice generating rhyming words, real or nonsense

  • Robot Talk! Practice saying the individual sounds (phonemes) in a word slowly, to isolate them. You will sound like a robot! (i.e. r-a-t)

  • Thumbs up! Say two words and give a thumbs up if they rhyme and a thumbs down if they don't

  • Put It Together! Say the individual sounds in words, such as /m/ /a/ /t/ and your child blends it together to say "mat"

What is Phonemic Awareness?

Phonemes are the individual sounds in words. For example, the word "bat" has 3 sounds or phonemes, each made by a letter in the word. Phonemic awareness is the ability of students to orally isolate each phoneme, WITHOUT the corresponding letter. This work allows students to both blend and segment words, which is an early literacy skill that predicts success in reading and writing.

How Can I Work With My Child at Home to Develop their Phonemic Awareness?

Practice the skills described above with a variety of words. Remember, phonemic awareness is about sounds, NOT letters. All of this work is done orally. Helping to develop your child's phonemic awareness should feel fun and game-like, and it might make a great car ride activity!