What every teacher should know

Reading 101: A Guide to Teaching Reading and Writing

Reading 101 is a collaboration with the Center for Effective Reading Instruction and The International Dyslexia Association.

Phonological and Phonemic Awareness: In Depth

Learn more about the development of phonological awareness skills in young children, why it's so important to teach this skill, and the value of multisensory instruction. You'll also find sample lessons for teaching phonological awareness.

The development of phonological awareness skills

Phonological awareness refers to a global awareness of, and ability to manipulate, the sound structures of speech.

The diagram below shows the development of phonological awareness in typical children, from the simplest, most rudimentary phonological awareness tasks, to full phonemic awareness.

Phonological awareness skills from simplest to most complex
Word*	Counting words in a sentence	Simplest
Syllable	Counting syllables Segmenting syllables Identifying first, last, middle syllables Blending syllables Manipulating syllables (adding, deleting, substituting)
Onset-rime**	Blending onset and rime Onset and rime completion Do words rhyme? Generating rhyming words	Complex
Phonemic awareness	Saying sounds in isolation Identifying sounds in words (e.g., first, last) Blending sounds to form a syllable Segmenting sounds in a syllable Manipulating sounds (adding, deleting, substituting)	Most complex

*Words (counting words in a sentence) is a language comprehension skill and not a phonological awareness skill. This step is included in the continuum for a reason. Children with low-language skills and English language learners may struggle with language at this level. A weakness at this level will hamper success at phonological awareness skills.

**The onset is the initial consonant or consonant cluster of a one-syllable word, and the rime is the vowel and any consonants that follow it.

Benefits of teaching phonological awareness

Processing the sounds of speech in oral language is a natural brain function. There is an area of the brain devoted to this task, which occurs below the level of conscious awareness when we are listening. It is only when children learn to read that they must become consciously aware of phonemes, because learning to decode in English requires matching sounds in spoken words to individual printed letters.

Lack of phonological awareness is a common reading weakness, including in people with dyslexia. Other students who struggle with reading, such as English language learners, may also have difficulties with phonological awareness.

Phonological awareness skills are best taught in kindergarten and early Grade 1 so they can be applied to sounding out words as phonics instruction begins. Research summarized in the National Reading Panel report suggested that even very modest amounts of instruction — as little as 5 to 18 hours in total — in phonological awareness at this stage can yield significant benefits to children’s reading and spelling achievement (Ehri, 2004).

Some children, particularly those who have serious decoding difficulties, may continue to need instruction in phonemic awareness beyond an early Grade 1 level.

Intervention

The activities for teaching phonological awareness in intervention are the same as teaching it to pre-readers, although children who need intervention may require much more intensity of instruction (e.g., smaller group size, more opportunities for practice) to develop phonological awareness. For children who are old enough for formal reading instruction (i.e., kindergarten and up), phonological awareness instruction should generally be integrated with phonics instruction.

For example, as children learn to segment spoken words into phonemes, they also learn to match the appropriate letters to those phonemes. The most important phonological awareness skills for children to learn at these grade levels are phoneme blending and phoneme segmentation, although for some children, instruction may need to start at more rudimentary levels of phonological awareness such as alliteration or rhyming. As skills are mastered, instruction moves to more difficult skills.

Multisensory instruction

Instruction is supported by using the body and manipulatives. Students benefit from watching the teacher’s mouth positions. They can also watch their own mouths with hand mirrors. Instruction is described in detail in the In-Practice section of this module.

Phonological awareness lessons

Phonological awareness lessons occur concurrently with teaching letter names and sounds. Teaching should include the following elements, taught concurrently:

Orthographic Pre-reading Skills		Phonological Pre-reading Skills
Skill	Activity	Skill	Activity
Letter names – small	Printing small letters	Syllable Activities	Single phonemes (no print)
Letter names – capitals	Printing capital letters		teach consonant sounds, and identify each consonant in the initial and final position
		Onset-rime	teach each short vowel sound, label each one, and identify each one in the initial position
			teach the long vowels, label each one, and identify each one in initial and final position
		Phonemic Awareness	teach the r-controlled vowels, label each one, and identify each one in initial and final position *
			teach other vowels (e.g., /oy/, label each one, and identify each one in initial and final position *

* Teaching r-controlled and other vowel sounds in isolation can wait until after phonics instruction has started — this may depend on the amount of time available and whether students have mastered prior skills.