Phonemic Awareness!

The research is very clear regarding the relationship between phonological/ phonemic awareness skills and later reading achievement. Children need to have an appreciation of how sounds can be put together to create words. It is critically important to incorporate phonemic awareness activities into our lessons. They really don’t need to take up a significant amount of time. Quick and easy activities such as the Doggie, Where’s My Bone? are perfect for use during your small group instruction.

Doggie, Where’s My Bone?

This particular activity teaches students to recognize the position of sounds within words. You simply say a word containing 3 sounds– such as “cat”– and then a sound within the word– such as /a/. The student places a bone on either the head, body or tail to indicate the position of the sound within the word. Just for fun, I use small rawhide bone. Also included in this file are paper bones.

Sound Switch Activity

Also contained within the download is the Sound Switch activity. For this activity, students are provided with two words (ball-bell). Students put the bone on the portion of the dog which contains a different sound. This is a pretty difficult task for young, developing readers. Make sure they are solid with identifying sound position within single words first.

Step-by-step teaching directions are included in this FREE download!