Growing Readers Together

Research tells us that, “The lack of

phonemic awareness is the most powerful determinant of the failure to read.” (Marilyn Adams, 1990).

Phonemic awareness activities take place orally and are about having fun with language play. Therefore, there is no need for any writing or reading during this practice.

Consider using the following activities at home with your child:

★ Give your child a word and have them repeat it back to you. Then, add a sound to the beginning and see

if they can tell you the new word.

Say race→ add */b/ to the beginning and the word is? → brace

Say car → add */s/ to the beginning and the word is?→ scar

Say lash → add */f/ to the beginning and the word is? → flash

★ Give your child a word and have them repeat it back to you. Then, take away the first sound and see if

they can tell you the new word.

Say blink→ without */b/ what’s left is? → link

Say crane→ without */c/ what’s left is? → rain

Say space→ without */s/ what’s left is? → pace

★ Books to enjoy together: Look for these books at the library that support phonological awareness!

○ Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson

○ Some Smug Slug by Pamela Duncan

○ Double Trouble in Walla Walla by Andrew Clements

Vowels are extremely important letters. Every single word contains at least one vowel. Some examples of vowel pairs are ai, ay, ea, and ee. Here are a few suggestions of ways for your child to practice working with vowel pairs.

• Talk about the long sound of a in words. Ask your child to help you think of words with the long a sound. Make columns of ai and ay words. You might also need a column for words with the silent e (ex. cake). Record words in the proper column. You can do the same thing for ea and ee words.
• Write words with ai and ay on index cards (ex. rain, main, play, day). Let your child sort them into two columns. You can do the same thing with ea and ee.
• Write words with ai, ay, ea, and ee on index cards. Turn the cards face down and spread them out on a table. Let your child play memory with the cards. She needs to look for words with matching vowel pairs.

It is important for children to be able to manipulate sounds in words. The sound in the middle of words is sometimes difficult for students to manipulate. The following suggestion is an activity for students to practice working with the vowel in the middle of a word.

• Say a word and ask your child to repeat it. Ask your child to say the sound he hears in the middle of the word. Ask your child to put a different sound in its place. (ex. Say the word map. Have your child repeat map. Ask your child to tell you the sound in the middle of the word. Then ask your child to put the sound of o in the middle instead. Your child should tell you that the new word is mop.)
• hat / hit / hot
• cap / cup / cop
• bag / bug / big
• bad / bed / bid
• lost / last / list
• fill / fall / fell

We need to remember that the main goal of reading is to understand what was read. After reading a book, it is important to discuss the book with your child to ensure that he understood the events in the story.

• Ask your child to start at the beginning of the book and tell you what happened in the story.
• If your child leaves out some of the main events, prompt him to remember more. If necessary, turn back to pages in the book and discuss information your child left out.
• Ask your child what the main idea of the book was.
• If your child is not sure what the main idea of the book was, have a discussion about the book to see if he can think more about the events of the story and determine what the book was mostly about.