Phonemic Awareness Tasks

1. Rhyming and Alliteration

Students identify and produce rhymes and alliteration (words that begin with the same sound).

Sample activity: Read aloud a nursery rhyme and have students identify the rhyming words.

2. Oddity

Students compare and contrast beginning, middle or final sounds.

Sample activity: Say “cat, pig, coat” and ask students which of the words begins with a different sound.

3. Blending

Say the sounds (phonemes) of a word and students put them together to form the word.

Sample activity: Tell the students to listen to the following sounds and have them blend the phonemes to make a word: / d u k / (duck).

4. Segmenting

Students break down words into phonemes. Students may also be asked to count or tap phonemes.

Sample activity: Ask students to identify the number of sounds in the word “hat” (3).

5. Manipulating

Students manipulate (remove, replace, reorder) the phonemes of a word.

Sample activity: Have students say “bat.” Ask them to say it again without saying the /b/ sound (“at”).