Several decades of research have established the critical role of phonemic awareness in the development of beginning reading. In particular, phonemic awareness makes early phonics instruction useful for children and facilitates their ability to blend letter sounds while decoding words, to learn sight words reliably, and to spell phonetically. A…

Reviews some basic knowledge of phonics all teachers should know. Provides instructional activities to incorporate phonics within a balanced literacy program. Recognizes different approaches to teaching phonics and the importance of phonics. Discusses the use of consonants, blends and digraphs, short vowels, long vowels, and other strange vowel…

Suggests three strategies to help students hear the sounds in words: developing phonemic awareness; explore sound/symbol relationships; and discover spelling patterns. This method is most effective if teachers continuously encourage students to think about how these strategies will help them as readers and writers. (SM)

Notes that the goal of phonics instruction is to help students develop the alphabetic principle. Explains how the words "explicit" and "systematic" are used in multiple ways in the context of phonics instruction. Suggests that educators should engage in serious discussions about how multiple approaches to phonics instruction…

Considers how good phonics instruction should encourage children to recognize rimes and to identify an unfamiliar word by blending its onset with the rime that follows. Discusses seven conclusions/implications for phonics software derived from research into phonics instruction. (SG)

This book is written for preservice and inservice teachers to explain basic theory of modern traditional word analysis programs and to supply suggestions and guidelines for classwide and small-group instruction in the various components of word analysis. Chapter 1 deals with ways of utilizing context clues to help children develop their…

Describes how some student teachers and cooperating teachers guided pupils in learning phonics through a study of rhyming poetry. Discusses class activities involved in teaching couplets, triplets, imagery in poetry, quatrains, alliteration, limericks, and onomatopoeia, and the rhyme and phonics elements involved. (SR)

The games presented in this manual are based on the Spin-A-Test game making technique, are applicable to the complex area of phonics, and are intended to provide teachers of reading with an almost unlimited source of circular games which meet prescriptive objectives. Contents of the manual consist of (1) a description of the scope of the game…

Hearing poetry read aloud should help pupils to achieve feelings of being relaxed and reenergized. Poetry might help pupils to achieve vital objectives in reading. Phonics instruction could become an inherent part of the reading of poems. For example, a student teacher and a cooperating teacher introduced pupils to a unit on "Poetry with…

A spelling study expert offers the following strategies for teaching elementary students to spell: making word-sorting games that categorize words by shared characteristics; playing letter-sequencing games; examining how root words and affixes combine to form new words; making spelling meaningful; and linking spelling study with editing and…

Clarifying the place of phonics and spelling in a whole language program, this book presents classroom-tested strategies, models, and activities to help students make graphophonic connections, giving them the tools they need to become confident, lifelong readers and writers. Chapters in the book are: (1) Phonics and Spelling in Perspective; (2)…

Describes how one elementary educator teaches word study strategies that enlarge students' understanding of phonics and vocabulary. A primary level activity has students create a thematic word wall. An intermediate level activity has students conduct a new word hunt. A reproducible student page helps students sort words by sound. (SM)

This article presents 20 activities to promote phonemic awareness in students, including teaching nursery rhymes, playing the "I Spy" game using initial sounds of words, creating a sound box, having students sort picture cards based on initial sounds, playing phoneme deletion games, and having students clap and count syllables. (Contains 4…

Experienced whole language teachers have developed a number of practical strategies that can and should be used to facilitate the development of "graphophonic knowledge" in their students' literacy learning. Graphophonic knowledge is defined as the combination of the sound system (phonology), the graphic system (orthography), and how…

One of a series of educational packages designed for implementation either in a workshop atmosphere or through individual study, this Hot Topic guide presents a variety of materials to assist educators in designing and implementing classroom projects and activities centering on the topic of research about teaching reading. The Hot Topic guide…