Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness is the awareness of the smallest sounds in speech.  Like Phonological Awareness, Phonemic Awareness is an auditory skill.  Phonemes refer to the smallest unit of sound within a word.  For instance, “cat” has three phonemes:  /k/ /a/ /t/.  It is important to note that phonemes relate to the number of sounds, not letters, in a given word.  For example, the word “shop” also has three phonemes:  /sh/ /o/ /p/ because the first two letters, “sh”, combine to make one sound.  The word, “streak” has six letters, but five phonemes:  /s/ /t/ /r/ /ē/ /k/.  An awareness of speech sounds, phoneme awareness, is an essential building block of learning to read.

In order of complexity, components of phonemic awareness include the ability to identify initial, final, and medial sounds in words, phoneme blending, phoneme segmentation, phoneme deletion, and phoneme manipulation.

 

Examples of Identifying Initial Sound

I’m going to say a word.  I want you to tell me the first sound you hear in the word “big”.  The student should respond with /b/.  If the student responds with the letter name (“b”), remind him or her to make the sound.

 

Examples of Identifying Final Sound

I’m going to say a word.  I want you to tell me the last sound you hear in the word “wish”.  The student should respond with /sh/.  If the student responds with a letter name, remind him or her to make the sound.

 

Examples of Identifying Medial Sound

I’m going to say a word.  I want you to tell me the sound you hear in the middle of the word “beach”.  The student should respond with /ē/.  If the student responds with a letter name, remind him or her to make the sound.

 

Examples of Phoneme Segmentation

I’m going to say a word.  I want you to say each sound in the word “snake”.  The student should respond with /s/ /n/ /ā/ /k/ (4 sounds).  If the student appears to have trouble with this skill, provide cubes and have him push up a cube for each sound he hears.

 

Examples of Phoneme Blending

I’m going to say each sound in a word.  I want you to put the sounds together and say the whole word:  “/f/ /a/ /s/ /t/”.  Student should respond with “fast”.

 

Examples of Phoneme Deletion (in order of complexity)

 

Initial Sounds:  I am going say a word and I want you to say the word without the beginning sound:  “cheat without /ch/” (eat).

 

Final Sounds:  I am going say a word and I want you to say the word without the ending sound:  “seat without /t/” (sea).

 

Initial Sound of Consonant Blends:   

I am going say a word and I want you to say the word without the beginning sound:  “spin without /s/” (pin).

 

Embedded Sound of Consonant Blends:

I am going say a word and I want you to say the word without the beginning sound:  “spit without /p/” (sit).

 

Examples of Phoneme Manipulation

I am going say a word and I want you to change a sound in that word:  “tape.  Now change /p/ to /m/” (tame).