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Phonological Awareness for Improving Reading Skills of Students

Reading ability serves as the foundation for all other learning. However, for many children, mastering the fundamental abilities required for reading can be a challenging process. This is where the concept of phonological awareness comes into play as an important skill to develop early on.

 

Understanding Phonological Awareness

 

Phonological awareness is the capacity for a person to identify and control the sounds of spoken language. It entails understanding and using the sounds of spoken words, including syllables, onset and rime, and individual phonemes (a language’s smallest units of sound). It is an important pre-reading skill since it serves as the foundation for phonics, spelling, and word recognition.

 

Fostering Phonological Awareness

 

1) Rhyming Games and Songs: Engage children in rhyming activities such as singing nursery rhymes, playing rhyming word games, or reciting silly rhymes. Rhymes assist children in identifying common sound patterns as well as improving their capacity to differentiate and manipulate sounds.

 

2) Sound Segmentation: Encourage children to break down words into distinct sounds or syllables.  Choose known short poems, such as “I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream!” Allow children to clap their hands after each syllable. Ask children to segment their names into syllables, such as Har-per, Ez-ra, Ab-ra-ham, and Ja-son. When children have mastered removing a word’s first phoneme (sound), teach them to segment short words into separate phonemes, such as s-u-n, p-a-t, and s-t-o-p.

 

3) Wordplay: Wordplay is manipulating words’ sounds by adding, deleting, or swapping them. For example, tell children to speak “bat” without the /b/ sound or “pan” without the /p/ sound. These activities help students understand how sound manipulation impacts word meaning.

Reference: http://www.ldonline.org/article/6254/

 

4) Phonics Instruction: Explain the relationship between sounds and letters through comprehensive phonics instruction. Teach children how to combine sounds to read words and segment sounds to spell words.

 

Phonological awareness is an important skill that lays the groundwork for successful reading and writing. Early phonological awareness development provides children with the tools they need to become confident and successful readers.

 

We at iGuide English Tutoring realize the significance of phonological awareness in a child’s literacy development. Our expert English tutors are committed to using research-based methods and engaging exercises to develop phonological awareness abilities, laying the groundwork for a solid reading foundation. Let us work together to enable children to explore the world of words. 


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About Author
Hina Adnan

Hina is an Ontario Certified Teacher with over 10 years of classroom and tutoring experience. She possesses expertise in the creation, implementation, and reinforcement of curricula as well as in mentoring and the professional advancement of her colleagues. She has taught in both public and private school systems and has a strong knowledge of students' learning needs.

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