I now have a clearer understanding of the building blocks of language, which are phonemes, syllables, onset-rime, and morphemes, and how they fit into teaching reading. Overall, this module showed me that literacy is more than just reading words, it’s about teaching strategies that support how the brain learns language.

• “Becoming familiar with 26 uppercase and
  26 lowercase letter shapes and associating
  these letter shapes to their letter names”
  (“Teaching Reading Sourcebook, p. 84)

• Letter-Name Iconicity: When the name of a letter contains the sound that the letter represents

• Letter names can be broken into phonemes

• Most letters begin or end with their main sound(iconic letters)

• Letters that do not contain any sound that they make are non-iconic

• Letters that look alike are more likely to be confused, letters that look similar and sound similar could be more confusing as well

• Why teach handwriting when teaching letters?

  Improves memory of letters

  Better spelling

  Longer high quality compositions

  Faster reading

  Needed everyday

• Phases of Writing Development:

  Prealphabetic

  Early Alphabetic

  Later Alphabetic

  Consolidated Alphabetic

• Assessments:

  Letter naming fluency

  Handwriting

• Sample Lessons:

  I Do, We Do, You Do

• Writing Learning Objectives

  “A clear and effective learning objective states what the learner will
  be able to do upon completion of a lesson, unit, or module, in terms
  of behavioral change.” (University of North Dakota, n.d.)

  Every lesson taught in the classroom should have a learning objective
  that is the end goal for students.

https://youtu.be/EmohchhXwW8?feature=shared

• The conscious awareness of individual speech sounds, or phonemes, (consonants and vowels) in spoken syllables (auditory)

Phoneme: The smallest segment of speech in a language that can determine word meaning, or can be combined with other speech sounds to make a new word

Phonological Awareness:

1. Includes the four developmental levels (word, syllables, onset-rime)

2. The foundation for Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness:

1. Considered the most advanced and crucial level for reading and spelling

2. Includes isolating, identifying, blending, segmenting, etc individual phonemes in words

Stop Sounds vs. Continuous sounds

1. Stop sound: a sound that can only be pronounced for only an instant

2. Continuous Sounds: a sound that can be pronounced for a prolonged period without the sound being changed

English has 44 phonemes but only 26 letters

Phonological Awareness Skill Levels:

1. Word

2. Syllable

3. Intrasyllable (Onset-Rime)

4. Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness Skills:

1. Isolation

2. Identify

3. Categorization

4. Blending

5. Segmentation

6. Deletion

7. Addition

8. Substitution

The idea of phonological awareness being the broader umbrella and phonemic awareness being the most advanced level also stood out to me. I see students move through those stages—first working with words and syllables, then eventually breaking things down into individual sounds. It reminds me how important it is to be patient and give them time at each level, instead of rushing them.

I also realize how useful it is to think about stop sounds versus continuous sounds, because that’s something I rely on when I model stretching out words for students. Having the vocabulary to describe what I already do makes me feel more confident as an educator. Overall, this information just reinforced what I’ve learned from hands-on experience: phonemic awareness isn’t just one part of reading instruction, it’s the key piece that makes everything else possible.

• Pre-Alphabetic Phase: Children recognize words using visual cues or context, not letters or sounds.

• Partial Alphabetic Phase: Children begin to connect some letters to sounds, but only partially; they can read simple words.

• Full Alphabetic Phase: Children can read words by decoding all letters and sounds, connecting them fully.

• Consolidated Alphabetic Phase: Children recognize groups of letters (like chunks or patterns) in words, making reading faster and more automatic.

What is decoding?:

"looking at a word and connecting the
letters and sounds and then blending those sounds
together"(pg 170)

Essential skill for reading development

What is Phonics?:

Teaching the relationship between phonemes and graphemes

Using these relationships to read and spell words

Explicit Phonic Lesson:

1. Phonemic Awareness

2. Introduce Sound/Spelling

3. Blend Words Incorporating New
   Sound/Spelling

4. Build Automatic Word Recognition

5. Apply to Decodable Text

6. Word Work

   1. dictation

   2. word building

   3. word activities

Decodable text is important because it allows students to apply the skills they have learned to read words

The best way to identify if a student has
mastered a sound/spelling correspondence is to
use nonsense words