CORE UNDERSTANDING 9: Children develop phonemic awareness and knowledge of phonics through a variety of litearcy opportunities.

Debate over early literacy development centers on

1. the place of phonemic awareness
2. the place of phonics

Some research shows PA as an important factor in reading, while other research suggests PA and phonics are necessary but not sufficient for readers.

Policy decisions that influence education waiver with the definition of reading. Is it a process of decoding? or of making meaning? Those who think reading is making meaning feel that too much focus on the parts takes away attention needed for the whole. Those who see reading as decoding point to high performance on standardized tests (KB, 79).

A balance is needed.

Instruction in PA
Explicit instruction may be necessary for some students, but these are general, research based, instructional strategies:

1. Language play: games for rhyming and thinking about structure of words.
   
2. Sociodramatic play: thematic activities to expand integration and extend understanding of language and stories.
3. Reading aloud: models what language sounds like and how one reads.
   
4. Opportunities to help children notice and use letters and words: alphabets, word walls, visual aspects of print.
5. Invented spelling: trying out spelling of words using phonemic awarenss and phonic knolwedge.
6. Dictated Text: reading dictated text helps connect sound to grapheme.
7. Reading for meaning
   
8. Rich text experience

Phonics Instruction--incorporate with reading for meaning!

CORE UNDERSTANDING 8: Children's understandings of print are not the same as adults'

Concepts of Print
Adults understand that alphabetic principles govern written language. Children are unaware of this, instead the "perceive written language and provide evidence that they are aware that there is a message in that transaction when they read "break the car" in response to a stop sign or "toothpaste" in response to a Crest label" (Braunger & Lewis, 2006. p. 74).

Children must become aware of the meaning in written language.

Onset= consonants before a vowel in spoken syllable
Rimes= are the vowel and any consonants after the onset.

The Role of Phonemic Awareness in Learning to Read

Notes from "What research has to say about reading instruction" by Alan E. farstrup, S. Jay Samuels. (Ch 6 p. 110)
Phonemic Awareness (PA)

• Is one of the leading predictors of how well chilren will learn to read upon school-entry.
• Phonemes are the smallest units of spoken language. (English has 41-44)
• Words most often consist of a blend of phonemes.
• PA is the ability to focus on and manipulate sounds in spoken words.

PA Tasks

1. Phoneme isolation--what is the first sound in "paste".
   
2. Phoneme identity--"tell me the sound that is the same in bike, boy, and bell"
3. Phoneme categorization--"which word doesn't belong? bus bun or rug"
4. Phoneme blending-- What word is /s/ /k/ /u/ /l/? (school)
5. Phoneme segmentation--how many sounds in ship? /sh/ /I/ /p/ (three)
6. Phoneme deletion--"what is smile with out the /s/?" (mile)

Phonemes vs Graphemes

1. Graphemes are letters or multiple letters (Ch, Sh, TH) that symbolize a phoneme.

Phonemes vs Phonics

1. Phonics is the connection between phoneme and grapheme (letter) to spell or decode words.
2. Phonological awareness is different still.

• understanding of how phonemes can be used with rimes, onset, and syllables.
  

ELLs are likely to misperceive some English phonemes because their linguistic minds are programed to categorize phonemes in their first language.

PA and Learning to Read
English is an alphabetic language that connects phonemes to graphemes.
PA is important because new readers need PA to:

• decode new words by blending phonemes
• segment a word into phonemes to remember/spell individual words.
  
• no breaks in speech signalling a new phoneme, so readers need instruction.
  

Teaching PA

• Important for moving preschoolers and kindergarteners closer to reading.
• PA instruction includes games, songs, and taks that ask students to isolate, segment, blend, delete and otherwise manipulate phonemes.
• Shown to improve reading performance in first two years of school.
• most effective for younger children.
  
• connections with print help enhance literacy acquisition.
• Segmenting and blending are especially important for reading