Literacy, meaning the ability to read, is a critical component in the development of language skills. Reading expands vocabulary and improves language comprehension. It provides models for correct syntax and grammar, and it can help children become better communicators. It also stimulates cognitive development by encouraging critical thinking and problem solving.
How can we best respond to a child who is struggling to read? In order for children to become proficient readers, they must first develop phonological awareness skills.
What is Phonological Awareness?
Phonological awareness involves recognizing and manipulating the sounds that are the components of words. Children with poor phonological awareness skills often have difficulty learning to read, and children with speech sound errors and language disorders typically have poor phonological awareness. Fortunately, phonological awareness can be improved through proper interventions.
Phonological awareness skills range from simple to complex. Early readers can identify the number of syllables in words and recognize rhyming words. They can determine which words start with the same sound (e.g., boy and bird). More complex phonological awareness skills involve blending sounds into words and segmenting words into sounds. The most difficult skill is deleting and manipulating the distinct sounds in words (e.g., changing the initial sound in “cat” to “b” -> “bat”). (Schuele & Boudreau, 2008)
Expectations
Preschool children are usually able to identify the initial sounds in words, and they demonstrate some rhyming abilities. They can also segment words into syllables. During early to middle kindergarten, children can match and generate rhyming words, match words with identical beginning and final sounds, and segment words into initial sounds and final sounds. By late kindergarten, they can segment and blend words containing two or three sounds (e.g., go, cat, moon). In early first grade, they can blend and segment sounds in words containing consonant blends (e.g., skate, jump). (Schuele & Boudreau, 2008)
How can I support my child?
When teaching phonological awareness, we want to model correct answers and also teach children how to arrive at them. For example, when teaching the initial sound in a word, we can instruct a child that the first sound in “cat” is /c/. Then we can expand the child’s understanding by having her imitate the sound and say it with us, and finally we can ask her the question, “What is the first sound in “cat”?”
Blending and segmenting sounds are particularly important phonological awareness skills. To teach a child how to blend sounds into a word, you can repeat the sounds slowly, elongate the continuous sounds, model blending them together, and then say the word naturally. To teach her how to segment a word into sounds, you can repeat the word, elongate stretched sounds, emphasize short sounds, and then segment the words into sounds (Schuele & Boudreau, 2008).
Because this type of instruction does not require a pencil and paper, it’s easy to implement. While you are in the car or standing in line at the grocery store, you can practice phonological awareness. Here are some examples:
Listen to the sounds – “J” “U” “M” “P.” Say them with me. What word is that?
Listen to the word “jump.” “JUUUUMMMMP” Say it with me. What are the sounds in jump?
Listen to the words “cat,” “bat.” Say them with me. Do they sound the same at the end?
As children get older and their phonological awareness skills improve, we can continue to work on their literacy and spelling skills. We might transition from working with the sounds in words to working with letters. We can try playing simple games in order to make learning fun. We can spell words aloud for our child and ask her to identify them. Then, working from a word list of more challenging words, she can spell words aloud and ask us to guess them.
Phonological awareness skills are critical to developing literacy. When parents know how to implement appropriate interventions, they can support the development of such skills at home.