Our Language Arts program includes a wide variety of learning activities to instill the many components of literacy. Some of the methods we use in the classroom are; small group instruction, large group instruction, learning centers, "Big Books" for shared reading lessons, interactive writing lessons, teacher and student journals, and phonemic awareness activities.
What is phonemic awareness? A "phoneme" is simply a sound. (The word "CAT" has 3 phonemes or sounds; C-A-T. The word shoe has 2 phonemes or sounds; sh-oe.) Phonological awareness is simply a gradual progression through these different levels, resulting in reading.
Level 1; rhyming; focus on the ending sound; ale/tale.
Level 2; alliteration; focus on the beginning sounds; dog/dirt.
Level 3; sentence segmenting; focus on breaking up the words; clap each word in a sentence.
Level 4; syllable blend/segment; focus on individual letter sounds; D-O-G.
Level 5; Onset Rime blending and segmenting; the onset is the beginning consonants of a word-the rime is the rest of the word, beginning with a vowel. Ex; sh/op or p/uppy.
Level 6; Segmenting of individual phonemes; single letters make a word; D-O-G is dog, and T-H-A-T is that.
