2. Phoneme Awareness Skills

Now let's take look at the different skills of phoneme awareness. 

Students with good phoneme awareness can isolate the beginning, ending, and middle sounds when they hear or say a word. It allows them to separate out all the sounds (phonemes) in a word and to match these sounds to written letters.

For example, students with good phoneme awareness know that the word igloo is made up of the beginning sound /i/, the middle sounds /g/ and /l/, and the ending sound /o͞o/.

Listen to igloo. Repeat the word out loud and isolate the phonemes.

What Are the Skills of Phoneme Awareness?

As accomplished readers, we automatically visualize letters in our minds when we talk about speech sounds. When we teach phoneme awareness, we're building the foundation that our beginning readers will use to match sounds to letters. For many students, the process of reading falls apart at this basic level of phoneme awareness.

Phoneme awareness involves a variety of skills that your students will eventually use to read and spell. Segmenting (breaking words into sounds) and blending (bringing separate sounds together to say word) are the primary skills.

Once students can segment and blend phonemes, they might enjoy the challenges presented by additional ways of playing with words. You and your students can also add phonemes, delete phonemes, substitute phonemes, and even reverse phonemes in words.

In this lesson, we'll walk you through each of these skills:

• phoneme segmentation
• blending phonemes
• adding phonemes
• deleting phonemes
• substituting phonemes
• reversing phonemes

Let's Get Started! 

1. Phoneme Segmentation

Segmenting phonemes is the process of breaking a whole word into its separate beginning, middle, and ending sounds. 

For example, the spoken word duck can be broken into separate beginning, middle, and ending phonemes: /d/, /ŭ/, and /k/.

Listen and tap the phonemes in duck.

When you practice this skill with students, you might say something like this: 

The word is duck. Repeat the word.

Students say: 

Duck.

You say: 

Let's tap the sounds together. 

Together, you all say:

/d/,  /ŭ/,  /k/, duck

Then you repeat the word and use it in a sentence.

Duck. 

The duck was swimming in the pond.

Ms. Huggins followed a similar routine to the example script above. 

1. Pronounce the word.
2. Repeat the word.
3. Tap the word while giving the sounds.
4. Repeat the word.
5. Count the number of sounds.

Consider this routine as you rewatch the lesson with your own children in mind. Think about: 

• Why is it important to have the students repeat the word?
• Why is it important to have students tap and give the sounds in the word?
• Did you notice how Ms. Huggins started with words with fewer sounds like in cat and progressed to words with more sounds, like in smart? Which do you think is easier? Why do you think she made this teaching decision?
• Think about what students must do when spelling unfamiliar words. How does segmenting sounds in words support the work needed to spell words? 

2. Blending Phonemes

Blending phonemes is the process of combining individual phonemes into a whole spoken word. 

For example, the three phonemes /l/, /ē/, and /f/ can be combined together to say the whole word leaf. 

Listen and blend the phonemes.

When you practice this skill with students, you might say something like this: 

Listen, I will say the sounds in a word, and you put the sounds together to say the word.

/l/, /ē/, /f/ 

What’s the word?

Students say: 

Leaf.

Then you repeat the word and use it in a sentence. 

Leaf.  

A leaf turns red in the fall.

Here's a demonstration video with teacher Jenifer Rogers who works with her students on blending phonemes to make words. Notice how Ms. Rogers taps the sounds and then pulls them together. 

As you watch the lesson, notice how Ms. Rogers taps each sound as she pronounces it. 

• Why do you think she does this?
• Did you notice that all the students are looking at Ms. Rogers as she pronounces each sound. Why is this important?

In this Quick Look video, teacher Ashley Powell demonstrates a lesson with students on substituting phonemes to make different words, for instance going from wig to fig.

You’ve learned a lot about phoneme awareness skills! In the next section, we'll give you a chance to practice all that we’ve covered so far.