Facts In Action

Above, "In the Classroom" focuses on phonological awareness activities and how they help students become fluent readers. Here are ideas to incorporate phonological awareness activities into your teaching.

What activities can I do with my students?
You may already do many of these things in your classroom.

• Rhyming or alliteration activities
  • Nursery rhymes
  • Silly songs (anna-anna-bo-banna...)
    
  • Have kids find objects that begin with the same sound as their name (Bobby - book, box, etc.)
    
  • Read poetry or story books with rhyming and alliteration
    
    
• Practice isolating beginning, ending and middle sounds
  • Use everyday activities to talk about sounds. At snack time: "What sound is the same in "milk" and "muffin"?"
    
  • Play "I Spy" (I spy with my little eye something that begins with /b/)
    
  • Simon Says (Simon Says "Everyone who's name begins with /d/ hop on one foot")
    
    
• Teach segmenting — what sounds do you hear in "cat"? /c/, /a/, /t/ etc.
  
  
• Play clapping games to sound out syllables in names — Bobby: /Bob/ /by/

Find some great ideas for teaching skills to young learners at: http://www.ed.gov/teachers/how/early/teachingouryoungest/index.html

For more phonological awareness activity ideas, check out:
Starting Out Right: A Guide to Promoting Children's Reading Success (available free online): http://www.nap.edu/books/0309064104/html/index.html) Editor's note: This url has changed: http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?isbn=0309064104

Sources: Starting Out Right: A Guide to Promoting Children's Reading Success, M.S. Burns, P. Griffin, C.E. Snow, Editors; Committee on the Prevention of Reading Difficulties in Young Children, National Research Council

Facts in Action, November/December 2003