1. Phonemic Awareness
Phonemic Awareness is the ability to notice, think about, and work with individual sounds in spoken words.
It is not a visual process– it is aural.

2. Phonemic awareness is the conscious awareness of sounds in spoken words.
Phonemic awareness is one of the best predictors of success in learning to read.
(Bryant, Bradley, Maclean, and Crossland, 1989; National Reading Panel, 2000b)

3. Phonemic awareness is more likely to transfer to future decoding ability than to later word recognition and oral reading fluency abilities.
(Byrne & Fielding-Barnsley, 1995)

4. Continuum of Skills Rhyme (pre k - k)
Identifying words within a sentence (pre k - k)
Blending and segmenting compound words (pre k - k)
Blending and segmenting syllables (pre k - k)
Onset-rime segmentation (pre k - k)
Sound isolation (First – last) (k – 1)
Phoneme blending (k – 1)
Phoneme segmentation (k – 1)
Phoneme manipulation (k – 1)

5. How is Phonemic Awareness supported through Balanced Literacy?
Read Aloud and Shared Reading
Students have the opportunity to learn about sounds by:
Learning nursery rhymes
Learning songs
Reading text with repetitive language
Reading text with rhyme
Playing with words.

6. Phonemic Awareness continued
Word Work
Through word play which includes songs, chants, rhymes and riddles, students are taught:
How to segment
How to blend
Letter-sound relationships
To identify onsets and rhymes
B-A-T

7. Phonemic Awareness Writing Components
Letters, sounds and words are manipulated to create text through a gradual release of responsibility
from teacher to student.
Immersion -- Demonstration – Approximation – Employment
Student
Responsibility
Teacher
Responsibility
Write to/for – Write with – Guided writing – Write by

8. Teachers and students are engaged in encoding by breaking words apart and segmenting sounds.
Ss-cc-rr-aa-mm

9. Word play By replacing sounds to make new words
What word would you have if…
“Say it Fast Game” (Blending)
“Say it Slow Game” (Segmenting)

10. What Research Says… Explicit instruction – be intentional
Small groups – achievement grouped
Focus on one to two tasks at a time no more than 10 – 15 minutes per day
Component of balanced, integrated reading program
Phonemic awareness and letter knowledge are the two best school entry predictors of how well children will learn to read during the first two years of instruction