The activities in this chapter are arranged from simple to complex. While many can be used with children from Pre-K to grade three, those not appropriate for a particular developmental level are specified as such.





























The activities in this chapter are designed to be short, enjoyable, and to maximize student participation--thus, making whole class instruction feasible in most cases. There may be some situations, however, where smaller groups are needed in order to ensure that all students are benefiting from instruction. The activities can also be used easily by teacher associates, parent volunteers, or older students working with small groups.

Chapter Three: Learning About Sounds and Letters

Foundations of the Emerging Phase emphasized in this chapter are: Strengthening auditory and visual discrimination Developing phonemic awareness Recognizing and naming letters Developing knowledge of letter-sound relationships.

The activities in this chapter are divided into four sections. The first three sections describe activities that are foundational to the development of graphophonic abilities. These foundations include the development of:

• general listening abilities
• phonemic awareness
• letter recognition and letter naming.

The fourth section describes activities and strategies for development of the graphophonic cueing system itself--that is, for putting together aural, oral, and visual cues to decode unknown words.

Definitions of Central Terminology Graphophonics refers to the relationship between sounds and letters. It might more accurately be described as the relationship between sounds in speech and spelling patterns in print. This is because sounds are frequently conveyed by patterns of letters such as the oo in moon or the augh in caught. Many people refer to the study of these letter-sound relationships as phonics. Phonemic awareness is awareness that speech is comprised of separate sound elements, and the ability to segment spoken sentences and words into their constituent parts. It does not involve letter recognition (graphic knowledge). However, for the purposes of multi-sensory instruction, print may be involved in some phonemic awareness activities. Researchers have found it useful to teach onsets and rimes as part of word study. An onset is the consonant, blend, or digraph before the vowel in a syllable or one-syllable word (for example, the b in back). A rime is the vowel and any consonant after it (the ack in back). Onsets and rimes are used in the creation of word families. A phoneme is an individual sound component of a word (for example, back has three phonemes or sounds b, a, ck are the letters that represent each sound).

The first sets of activities are ones that can be used throughout the day. They can fit easily into regular classroom routines such as Shared Language²², Morning Meeting, or circle time or they can be used as short whole class foci before recesses or dismissal times. The stress in the last half of the chapter is on activities that can be integrated into units of study and other meaningful contexts. Suggestions for integration are given under the heading "Contextual Integration Possibilities" or are included in narrow margins.

Many possibilities exist for the sequencing of graphophonic instruction. Experienced teachers develop effective sequencing over time and adapt their sequence to meet the needs of individuals and groups. The sequence that follows is one suggestion only. It is created with reference to knowledge of child development and to the importance of incorporating phonemic awareness and graphophonic instruction into meaningful contexts. One example of such incorporation would be to sequence the teaching of initial consonant sounds partly around the initial consonants of your students' first names. With this practice, you might teach the sh digraph informally before all initial consonants had been learned if you had one or more students whose first name started with Sh.

Suggested Instructional Sequence for Phonemic Awareness and Graphophonics        Aural/Oral and Visual Discrimination Abilities Focus on Environmental Sounds Example: Sound Walks Sound/Listening Games Example: What's My Pattern? Phonemic Awareness Language Play Activities Rhyming Alliteration Songs, chants, etc. Segmenting and Blending Activities Count the words Clap the syllables Segmenting compound words Segmenting and blending syllables Segmenting and blending phonemes Initial and Final Consonant Deletion Examples: Say jeep. Say it again without the j. Say jeep. Say it again without the p. Graphophonic Activities Initial Consonants related to One Sound * (b, f, h, j, k, d, l, m, p, r, t, n, v, w, y, z) Initial Consonants related to Multiple Sounds (s, c, g, q, x) Y as a vowel Final Consonants Word Families (onsets and rimes) Short Vowels Consonant Blends Consonant Digraphs Medial Consonants (the t sound in kitten) Long Vowels r Controlled Vowels (ar, er, ir, or ,ur) Vowel Diagraphs (oo, ew, au, aw, oi, oy, ou, ow) Other Vowel Patterns (all, ough, augh) Focus on Shapes and Patterns in Environment Visual Discrimination Activities Examples: Name recognition activities, concept of letter/word activities Games Examples: Memory, Lotto (versions for young children) Letter Recognition Letter Discrimination/Forming Activities Examples: Guess my Letter ABC Center Structural Analysis s Ending es, ing, er, ed, est Endings Compound words Possessives ('s) Contractions * Experienced teachers suggest that b, d, and p, and m and n should not be taught together.