This toolkit helps teachers and families understand the difference between phonemic and phonological awareness and how to support a child's development of these important reading skills.
You will learn:
- What phonological and phonemic awareness are and why they are important.
- How teachers should teach phonological and phonemic awareness.
- How families can support phonological and phonemic awareness development.
This toolkit includes:
- Definitions
- Online Tutorials
- Supporting Materials
- Instructional Video
- Resources for Teachers & Families
Get Started
Definitions
This is a short overview of what phonemic awareness is, why it's important, and a few tips on how to teach it.
Phonemic Awareness
The ability to identify and play with individual sounds in spoken words.
Phonological Awareness
The ability to recognize that spoken words are made up of individual sound parts.
Online Tutorials
Build your knowledge and advance your skills. Gain the strategies you need to teach these topics with confidence.
What is Phonemic Awareness? Why is it important? How should it be taught? Learn the answer to these and other questions about Phonemic Awareness.
What is Phonological Awareness? Why is it important? How should it be taught? How can families support phonological awareness development? Learn the answer to these and other questions about Phonological Awareness.
Supporting Materials
Learn more about how to support a child's development of these important reading skills.
Phonological awareness involves being able to recognize and manipulate the sounds within words. This skill is a foundation for understanding the alphabetic principle and reading success. There are several ways to effectively teach phonological awareness to prepare early readers, including: 1) teaching students to recognize and manipulate the sounds of speech, 2) teaching students letter-sound relations, and 3) teaching students to manipulate letter-sounds in print using word-building activities.
Learning to read is difficult and does not happen naturally. It requires explicit and systematic instruction, which is especially important for struggling readers. Learning to read involves many different skills that must be taught to your child. Instruction in phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension will help your child learn to read.
Phonological awareness is like an umbrella. Rhyming, alliteration, sentence segmentation, syllables, onset and rime, and phonemic awareness all exist under this umbrella with phonemic awareness being the most advanced skill of phonological awareness.
Spotlight on Instruction
Watch this video about how to teach students how to recognize that words are made up of individual sound parts (phonological awareness).
Jeanne Wanzek, Ph.D., Associate Professor at Vanderbilt University and Carol Dissen, Expert Literacy Coach at the Center on Teaching and Learning at the University of Oregon, present on Recommendation 2: Develop awareness of the segments of sounds in speech and how they link to letters, from the Foundational Skills to Support Reading for Understanding in Kindergarten Through 3rd Grade: Practice Guide (WWC).
Resources for Teachers
Explore these on-topic resources, tips, and tools for teaching phonemic awareness and phonological awareness. Find the materials that work best for your classroom.
Dr. Louisa Moats, reading expert and consultant, illustrates the difference between a phoneme and a letter and explains why it is important to teach phonological awareness skills in addition to letter knowledge.
Topic: Phonemic Awareness
This lesson on phonemic awareness may be used to supplement reading instruction to meet student needs.
Topic: Phonemic Awareness
Review a daily lesson plan format that emphasizes preschool activity planning based on instructional objectives, program standards, and desired learning outcomes. Examples of phonological awareness objectives are included.
Topic: Phonological Awareness
Resources for Parents and Families
Check out this collection of resources and activities that can help you support your child's development of phonemic awareness and phonological awareness at home.
This resource provides strategies for families to use at home to support their infant through preschooler in developing phonological awareness.
Topic: Phonemic Awareness
Check out these evidence-based classroom practices that you might be able to adapt for home-use. (But please note that research has not investigated the efficacy of these practices in home contexts).
Topic: Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Fluency with Text
Explore More Toolkits
This toolkit helps teachers and families understand what the alphabetic principle and phonics are and how to support a child's development of these important reading skills.
This toolkit helps teachers and families understand what fluency is and how to support a child’s development of fluency with text.
