The document provides details on a final project for a course on teaching phonemic awareness in the classroom. It includes a template to develop plans for phonemic awareness assessment, activities, and instruction. The template requires at least one example of a student assessment and analysis. It also requires incorporating at least one technology tool from the course and details on other phonemic awareness activities. The document includes an example lesson plan and strategies for teaching phonemic awareness to a class with diverse abilities through multisensory activities.

1. Supporting Phonemic
Awareness in the Classroom
By Meaghan Geary Cryan

2. Final Project Directions
As a final project, you will develop plans for teaching phonemic awareness in your
classroom, including plans for assessment procedures, analysis, and activities. This
final project template will also include one example of a phonemic awareness
assessment and analysis on a student.
Your plans should incorporate at least one of the technology tools explored in this
course and include details for other types of phonemic awareness strengthening
activities.
Complete this template as the course progresses. This template is due to your
facilitator at the end of Session Six. At that time, your facilitator will review your final
project and provide feedback for you in the Notes section.

3. GRADE: Preschool/Pre-K (mixed; ages 3 to 5 years)
SPECIAL NEEDS CONSIDERATIONS: Mackenzie: 4.5 yrs has a Moderate-Severe Phonological Impairment; above average
receptive speech, no cognitive delay; fine and gross motor skills are developmentally appropriate; no social delays and/or
concerns.
LESSON BLOCK LENGTH: 15 to 20 minutes per activity (an additional 5 minutes may be necessary for setup/ instructions).
IS PHONEMIC AWARENESS CURRENTLY BEING ADDRESSED IN YOUR CLASSROOM? IF SO, HOW?
o Phonemic awareness is currently being addressed through a multitude of speech and language exercises and
activities, such as:
1.SINGING WITH RHYMES: "Down by the Bay" and "The Ants Go Marching“
2.SYLLABLE FUN:“Syllable Clapping/Counting” Activity: clap out syllables in each student‟s name
3.READING RHYMES: Reading aloud books focused on rhyme, such as Dr Seuss:
 → Green Eggs and Ham‟, „Hop on Pop‟, „The Cat in the Hat‟, „One Fish Two Fish”
 → I encourage “filling in the blanks” by pausing at the end of a sentence
 → Students will chime in to “fill in” the rhyme
•However, all past activities were rather informal Phonemic Awareness Activities, not deliberate, specific and structured.
•As we know from our readings, Phonemic Awareness Skill Instruction is more productive and effective when instruction is
both deliberate and purposeful and targeted toward a specific skill (Yopp & Yopp, 2000; B&A)
•Therefore, we have already started to integrate a more goal-oriented, structured (yet playful and fun!!) PA
Instruction into our course curriculum.

4. Part II: Phonemic Awareness
PHONEMIC AWARENESS: A CRITICAL STEP IN READING DEVELOPMENT
While Phonemic Awareness skills can and should be developed prior to the introduction of printed text, Phonemic
Awareness provides some of the most essential "building blocks" to a student's early reading development.
o PA is essential to learning to read in an alphabetic writing system b/c letters represent certain sounds or phonemes
o PA is fundamental in mapping spoken word to print
o PA gives students the ability to hear and manipulate sounds in spoken word and also the understanding that words
and syllables are created through sequences of speech sounds/phonemes (Yopp & Yopp, 1992)
CURRENT ASSESSMENT METHODOLOGY:
Phonemic Awareness was not being formally assessed prior to this course. Going forward, my goal is to assess PA Skills at regularly
scheduled intervals, as recommended (Phonemic Awareness, U of Oregon):
o All Student Goal: to assess all students at least 3 times per school year At-Risk Student Goal: 1-2 times per month
AT-RISK STUDENTS:
Early indicators of students at-risk include failure to progress and master developmentally appropriate PA skills even after explicit,
repeated, and (if necessary) direct instruction has been given overtime. Issues or delays in the following areas will be monitored
closely:
1) Group words with similar and dissimilar sounds (such as, hat, bat, car)
2) Blend/segment words into syllables
3) Segment a word into a "sequence of sounds“ (decipher where phonemes end/begin)
4) Detect, Delete and Manipulate phonemes in initial, final and medial positions
5) History of Speech and/or Language Disorder or Delay (especially, but not limited to, children diagnosed with Phonological
Impairments)
FUTURE ASSESSMENTS: In addition to monitoring and observing each student’s skill level, I plan to assess all students at least 3
times per school year (Fall, Winter, Spring) and at-risk students 1-2 times per month.

5. Part III: Linguistic Components
Yopp & Yopp (2000) give an impressive review on a variety of clever, playful and skill-specific PA Activities. In
addition, these activities are cost efficient and easy to integrate into most early education classrooms and/or
learning centers. Below (Table 1) I have included some of my favorites:
Table 1: PA ACTIVITIES (YOPP & YOPP, 2000)
Activity PA Skill Description
Summary
Pre-Assessment
Prediction
“The Hungry
Thing”
(Slepian &
Seidler)
Rhyming Nonsense rhymes are clues; encourage
children to predict rhyme or makeup new
nonsense words.
Developmentally appropriate PA
Skill for Pre-K, fairly easy to
integrate, but unsure due to speech
d/o
“Tikki Tikki
Tembo”
(Mosel)
Syllables:
Segmenting
Clap out the syllables in boys’ names; then
go around class, clap out syllables in own
names
Easy to integrate, but may prove
challenging for my students
“Down By The
Bay”
(Raffi)
Rhyming Sing this familiar song, then encourage
students to make up their own rhyme
Familiar song, easy to integrate,
should prove to be beneficial to
class
“Cock-a-Doodle-
Moo”
(Most)
Phoneme
Manipulation
Story uses phoneme addition and
substitution; make up other sounds for
animals not included
Easy to integrate, will be enjoyable
but more challenging PA Skills
involved
This Table is based on my pre-assessment beliefs and activities of interest. Post-assessment and initial
activities, I gained a better understanding of each student‟s abilities and developed additional PA activities to
integrate into our classroom curriculum. These activities will be addressed in following slides.

6. Part IV: Audio Recording Practice
Reflect on this practice. How do you imagine audio recordings will help you teach and your students learn about phonemic awareness?
Audio Recordings & Instruction:
 Audio recording can benefit instruction in a variety of ways. First of all, Audio recordings could play an extremely helpful
role in instruction and technology.
o For example, on an iPAD Application, a student could listen to the audio recordings of phonemes while playing an educational
game.
• Then, the student could practice his own pronunciation by recording his voice onto the iPAD.
• Some apps, for example, “SmartyEars”, will ask the student to record audio files as part of the game/activity, and
will then save the recordings in order for the teacher to review the student’s performance and to monitor progress.
Listening Skills & Phonemic Awareness:
 Listening Skills are a crucial component to the development of Phonemic Awareness.
• Just as an early reader must have visual acuity must develop in order to even begin developing Phonemic Awareness is
listening. students explore speech sounds by hearing, feeling and seeing their characteristics and comparing and
contrasting their properties.
•Topic: What PA Skills are most important?
Why? When should these skills be taught?
1st
Recording
•Topic: Practice pronouncing the 40 phonemes
in the Applet. Record all phonemes.
2nd
Recording

7. Part V: Student Assessment
Which assessment will you be using on your student?
Audio Recording of Student Assessment
 Assessment used: the Stratford Foundation Phonemic Awareness Assessment Tools (SFPAA) (complete version)
Student Profile:
 Mackenzie is a 4.5 yr old girl diagnosed with a Phonological Impairment (moderate-severe)
 Speech d/o is purely expressive (she does not have a receptive speech delay)
 Her sound production disorder is thought, by some professionals, to be caused by Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS)
Speech and Phonemic Awareness:
 Phonological Impairments are commonly explained as a child‟s “underdeveloped system of language”
• Many speech pathologist find that this is due to a lack of Phonemic Awareness
• In addition, most children with diagnosed Phonological Impairments do not seem to realize that they are
pronouncing sounds incorrectly and many show increased frustration and agitation when others cannot understand
their speech, because to the child, it sounds correct
• However, in Mackenzie‟s case, she is aware of her inability to pronounce certain sounds, but cannot physically
correct herself due to a sound production issue (and/or CAS)
• Due to Mackenzie‟s awareness of her distorted sounds and “unintelligible” speech, I am curious as to whether or not
Mackenzie will struggle with Phonemic Awareness and early literacy skills like most children with her diagnosis
Audio Recording of Student Assessment:

8. Part VI: Assessment Analysis
Part 1: Rhyme Recognition
o The first assessment focused on rhyme recognition. Following the scripted instructions on the SFPA, I first explained what constituted
a rhyme (matching final/end sound) and gave my student two examples of rhyming word pairs (cat-fat, gate-skate) and one example of
a non-rhyming word pair (cat-dog).
o Although Mackenzie had a bit of difficulty keeping her eyes closed upon instruction, she enjoyed the “thumbs up, thumbs down”
instructions, and identified all 8 pairs correctly (8 out of 8).
o Rhyming was clearly Mackenzie’s strength in the overall assessment. This was a welcomed surprise, as I was unsure of her ability to
hear and recognize rhyme in the classroom!
Part 2:Beginning Sounds: Phoneme Isolation
o The second assessment measured Mackenzie’s ability to isolate the beginning sound in a given word. Mackenzie struggled on this task
due, in part, to her waning attention, and a number of other possible factors.
o First of all, unlike in the initial assessment, Mackenzie was instructed to repeat the word, in order to help her locate the initial sound.
However, due to her speech disorder, she had trouble with this task and was openly frustrated when asked to repeat each word.
o Although she did answer 4/5 correctly, I am not confident she truly understood the exercise. She lacked focus, became fidgety and
also kept repeating the phrases “thumbs up” and “thumbs down” from the first assessment.
o In addition, Mackenzie kept trying to introduce rhyming words to the exercise. Since we had been working on rhyming words over
the past month or two, I think she was eager to show her mother/teacher that she had developed rhyme awareness!
Part 3:Beginning Sounds: Isolation and Matching
o In the final assessment, Mackenzie’s attention span was completely used up: she was exhausted and confused about the point of the
activity. Either she did not understand or listen to the instructions, or she wanted to run the activity herself!
o This area proved to be an area of weakness for Mackenzie, which is not surprising given that she has had no explicit instruction
regarding isolating phonemes (yet!).
In Future Assessments:
• In future assessments, I will be sure to assess her with breaks in between exercises. I will plan to assess Mackenzie
once she has grown familiar with more than just rhyming. It will be interesting to see how she measures after the
new Phonemic Awareness Activities are integrated into our “class curriculum.”

9. • Overall, what stands out to me most is that I need to be more patient and thoughtful of my
student‟s age and attention span.
• Furthermore, in my observations post-assessment, I was able to gain some perspective and
realized the added struggles involved with assessing your own child. Not only did this present
issues for me as the tester, but also for my “student”:
• First of all, I do not think that I ever would have “pushed” another student to complete all three
assessments in one sitting. Although it was difficult for me to come to this realization, I am confident that,
in the future, I will be more mindful of this and will be as patient and respectful to Mackenzie as I would be
with any professional relationship.
• In addition, while listening to the recording of our assessment, I noticed that Mackenzie felt more pressure
to achieve success than she would have with an outside tester. In a way, this was also hard for me to
come to terms with because I would hate to think that I put too much pressure on my children. However, I
do not feel that this is the case: in fact, I believe that most 4 year old children would respond in a similar
manner, as parents mean an awful lot to them at this age!
• In the future, I will be cognizant of these observations and make sure that assessments are completed at a
slower pace, in an encouraging, low-pressure environment!
Part VI: Assessment Analysis
Continued….

10. LESSON PLAN
SPECIFIC SKILLS
TARGETED
PRODUCTS &
PERFORMANCES
RELEVANT
QUESTIONS
INSTRUCTIONAL STRATEGIES
(MULTISENSORY)
1. LITERATURE:
Read aloud books
that “play with
language”
ALLITERATIONS,
RHYMING,
NONSENSE WORDS,
PHONEME
MANIPULATION
(ISOLATION,
SUBSTITUTION,
DELETION)
1) THE HUNGRY
THING ACTIVITY
2) COCK-A-DOODLE-
MOO
3) THE CAT WHO
WORE A POT ON
HER HEAD
1) WILL STUDENTS
ALL UNDERSTAND
THESE ACTIVITIES,
GIVEN SPEECH
AND AGE RANGE?
2) WILL THE
PLAYFUL, FUN
ATMOSPHERE
RELIEVE STRESS
OR FRUSTRATION?
INCREASE FUN & INTERACTION
BY INTEGRATING ADDITIONAL
LEARNING MODALITIES:
• EACH STUDENT CREATES
HUNGRY THING PUPPET; THE
STUDENTS COME UP WITH
WORDS HE WOULD USE FOR
VARIOUS FOOD ITEMS (CUT
OUTS).
2. SONGS:
RHYMING,
NONSENSE WORDS,
PHONEME
MANIPULATION
(ISOLATION,
SUBSTITUTION,
DELETION)
1) DOWN BY THE BAY
2) MISS MARY MACK
3) OLD MACDONALD
4) THE ANTS GO
MARCHING
(VARIATIONS)
1) DO I NEED TO
INCLUDE A SONG
FOCUSING MORE
ON BLENDING
SOUNDS?
MUSICAL, RHYTHMIC
CLAPPING, KINESTHETIC,
AUDITORY, ORAL, ENGAGING
FOR ALL!
3. GAMES
ONSET-RIME,
RHYMING,
ISOLATING,
SEGMENTING
SOUNDS, SYLLABLES
& SENTENCES
1) BINGO
2) ELKONIN BOXES
3) RHYMING GAMES
4) POKER CHIPS
5) PA PHONE
6) HOPSCOTCH
7) REWARD BIN!
1) HOW CAN I MAKE
THESE GAMES AS
FUN AS POSSIBLE,
WITHOUT TAKING
AWAY FROM THE
EDUCATIONAL
ASPECT?
PLAYFUL, ENGAGING, VISUAL
AND AUDITORY, KINESTHETIC,
SPATIAL AND REWARDING.
MANY ACTIVITIES OF THIS
NATURE LINK THE PHONEME
SOUNDS TO THE VISUAL TEXT,
THEREFORE ENCOMPASSING
BOTH PHONICS INSTRUCTION
AS WELL AS PA.
Table 2 displays the general activities we are currently integrating into our curriculum. Since
there are too many to mention in just one slide, I have categorized by type of lesson plan.

11. Part VII: Strategies, cont.
Include strategies you will use in your classroom here.
• Activities and procedures:
• All activities will be carried out in a playful and fun manner, but with a deliberate goal in mind as the instructor.
• Due to attention span, activities for Phonemic Awareness will be integrated into the daily routine.
• Some activities, such as “The Hungry Thing” Puppet Making Activity, was quite easily integrated into our curriculum and
conducted during Arts & Crafts and took approximately 25 minutes to complete.
• Other activities, such as songs and story telling, will be conducted during daily “circle time” and will take no longer than 15
minutes.
• Extensions and modifications
• Based on the Common Core Standards and the guidelines presented to me in our readings, I will monitor each student closely
to observe progress, strengths and individual limitations.
• If a child is even suspected to be at-risk in developing reading skills, then the child will benefit from early, basic phonemic
awareness instruction taught explicitly and directly, with increased repetition.
• Furthermore, I will only introduce new phonemic awareness skills once the more basic skills, such as rhyming, sentence
segmentation and syllable counting have been mastered. Given my small group size, I have already started to make a chart for
each individual, and have been able to introduce more advanced PA Skills, like isolating beginning sounds, in a one-on-one
environment with students who have already mastered the basics.
• Materials and resources needed
• Most materials needed are easily accessible through the use of book stores, such as the Scholastic online book store and
through Amazon.com. For example, the following books were purchased using Amazon: “The Hungry Thing,” “The Hungry
Thing Returns” and “The Hungry Thing Goes to a Restaurant” (all three books written by Jan Slepian & Ann Seidler), „Ten Cats
Have Hats” and “The Cat Who Wears a Pot on Her Head”(both by Jean Marzollo) and “Cock-a-Doodle-Moo” by Bernard Most.
• Other resources were already present in the classroom, such as Dr. Seuss books for beginning readers (“Hop on Pop” and “Cat
in the Hat”), as well as recommended readings like “Tikki Tikki Tembo” retold by Arlene Mosel and “Jamberry” by Bruce Degen.
• Additional Resources that we will continue to use are the LeapPad 2 (2) and the iPad 2 (1).
• Websites used
• A number of online resources continue to be helpful, including Reading Rockets (for reference and activity ideas) and
Commonwealth Learning Online Institute (for references and peer-reviewed research articles, as well as educational
websites, such as pbskids.com).

12. Part VIII: Common Core Standards
• Please list all relevant Common Core Standards here, as well as any of your state‟s relevant Proposed Additional Standards
MA.PK.R.F.2 Phonological awareness: Demonstrate understanding of spoken words, syllables, and sounds (phonemes).
MA.PK.R.F.2.a Recognize and produce rhyming words (e.g., identify words that rhyme with
/cat/ such as /bat/ and /sat/).
MA.PK.R.F.2.b Segment words in a simple sentence read or spoken.
MA.PK.R.F.2.c Identify the initial sound of a spoken word and generate a list of words that
have the same initial sound.
MA.PK.S.L.5 Create representations of experiences or stories (e.g., drawings, paintings, constructions of blocks or other
materials, clay models) and explain them to others.
MA.PK.S.L.6 Speak audibly and express thoughts, feelings, and ideas.
MA.PK.R.F.3 Phonics and Word Recognition: Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words.
MA.PK.R.F.3.a Link an initial sound to the corresponding printed letter and a picture of an object that begins with
that letter (e.g., link the initial sound /b/ to a printed “B” and to a picture of a ball).

13. Part IX: Technology
Create a Phonemic Awareness Activity using technology.
1.1) BRAINSTORMING PROCESS: Students will pick an appropriate, teacher approved “Word Family” based on instruction and
examples
2) Our classroom will use the MY STORY APP available on the iPAD OR STORYJUMPER (storyjumper.com) on the COMPUTER, if
iPADs are not available please visit storyjumper.com. For the purpose of today‟s lesson, I will be focusing on the MY STORY APP.
• Summary of the App: “My Story is perfect for young students because it offers a simple set of features: drawing, voice recording, photos, and text for
each page of an unlimited number of books. Kids can rearrange their pages, use 20 different colors with three different brushes, and start/stop recording with
the tap of a button.” – MYSTORYAPP.COM
1.3) Using a Word Family list and teacher support, each student will create a Word Family book using the app. For example, the “at”
family would be an easy word family for a beginner- in fact, my student Mackenzie is starting with this word family herself.
2.4) Student will create a basic story using the clipart and/or pictures provided in the app (I will make sure the proper clip art is
available ahead of time.
3.5) Once the book is completed, each child will practice and record an audio component . In this component, the child will record
her voice using the audio record feature. This component will help the student practice speaking and listening to develop a solid
understanding for word families and Phonemic Awareness.
4.6) Once story books and audio recording is complete, we will publish the book and sit back and enjoy our story!
Activity: Online Story
Books
Using an online story book creating program, each student will create a “Word Family Book”

14. Part IX: Technology Continued (Part 2)
Technology Resources:
1) LITERACY APPS FOR STRUGGLING LEARNERS By Harvey Pressman and Andrea Pietrzyk; Central Coast Children’s Foundation, Inc.
2) 6 iPhone, iPad, iTouch Apps for Teaching Children How to Read: http://www.iphoneandkids.com/2010/09/6-iphone-ipad-itouch-apps-for-teaching- children-how-to-
read.html
3) APPS FOR LITERACY INSTRUCTION: http://www.inov8- ed.com/2011/03/theres-a-special-app-for-that-part-7-apps-that-support-literacy- instruction/This site breaks
literacy down into categories, such as phonics and reading fluency.
4) ENCHANTED LEARNING WEBSITE (enchantedlearning.com)
5) PINTEREST & FACEBOOK groups and/or recommended App pages are also a useful tool and help to keep one "up-to-date" as technology quickly advances!
Language & Literacy Apps that I personally recommend:
1) iLearnWith Apps (iLearnWith.com):
•Offers cross-curricular apps developed by the same makers of PBS KIDS PLAY! And CBC WONDERWORLD learning programs (award winning
programs).
•Each student/child has his/her own profile and parents/teachers can monitor each child through Progress Tracking offered on the app.
•There are also rewards given to the student as they progress, along with recommendations to advance to new levels of learning based on progress
made!
•My 4 year old really enjoys these in particular:
•Learn with Boing!
•Ocean
•Weather
•These applications have also come highly recommended, although I have not yet tried:
• iWriteWords, iPlay & Sing, iKidsPlay
2)Lakeshore Apps:
Lakeshore Phonics Tic Tac Toe Game
Lakeshore interactive Sound Sorting Game (Beginning Sounds)
•

15. 3) GRASSHOPPER APPS (Grasshopperapps.com):
•Sentence Maker
•Bitsboard - APP OF THE YEAR
•Rhyming Words
4) SmartyEars Apps (SmartyEars.com):
•I have the Oral Motor App and Articulation Station
•All Apps are made by a speech language pathologist, but I would think that there may be benefits in using the app for early Phonemic Awareness
as well as early reading/literacy development
•In one activity, children view a scene focusing on a letter in either the initial, medial or final position and can record their own voice making up a
story.
•I believe the option to listen to an audio of each word is available throughout the entire application, and the students are also given the option of
recording their own voice saying each word, which they are then able to listen to themselves!
•In addition, these apps offer parent tracking capabilities and exciting reward activities and prizes (there is a trophy case for each letter in initial, final
and medial positions for each target sound in the Articulation Station App!)
•The Articulation Station added a new feature which offers "homework sheets" to parents/teachers: these sheets list all of the words used in each
scene to help aid in the student's progress outside the app itself.
5) Speech Journal
•Speech Journal is a customizable voice recorder that lets you pair recorded messages with your own imported images and image
sequences. Parents, teachers and speech-language pathologists can create customized picture sequences, multi-step picture schedules,
articulation drills, expressive language exercises, multi-step directions, individualized social stories, sample conversations and more.
Part IX: Technology Continued (Part 3)

16. Part X: Reflection
Technology in our current curriculum has centered around iPad applications, rather than on desktop/laptop -
based computer games. I would say that, on average, students have the opportunity to use the iPad for language -based
games once daily: sessions on the iPad could last anywhere from 10 minutes to 25 minutes, depending upon the activity.
While certain applications work best with adult support, there are also applications available to the students which promote
independent play as well. One of the best features to these applications is that they alow the teacher to set up a profile for
each student and monitor student progress in specific areas. This not only allows for independent play, but also keeps a
more reliable, quantitative record of raw data and basic statistics than I would be able to record on each individual myself.
Furthermore, many applications allow me to adjust the activity based on each child’s level o f phonemic awareness.
•In addition to the iPad, each student has an individual Leap Pad 2, which is a tablet designed specifically for
children ages 3 to 9 years of age. Similar to certain iPad applications, the teacher or parent can set up an individual profi le
on each student and target specific skill sets to monitor progress and record data. Obviously, this is an expensive resource
and I realize it is not feasible in most classrooms, but I wanted to include this technology as it is an integral technologic al
component to my current curriculum.
•Computer-Based Approach Interestingly, my students have had very little exposure to technology without a
“touch screen” feature, which created a major obstacle as we tested the various recommended PA Activities listed in
Session 5‟s Table. My students did not have the computer skills necessary to perform any of the activities independently. I
feel remiss in having not introduced my classroom to an actual computer and how to navigate using a mouse and a key
pad. Since this will prove to be an essential skill in their education, I plan to incorporate computer skills into the curric ulum
as well. I am confident that my “tech savvy” students will quickly learn how to operate a desktop/laptop computer, and
there are an endless amount of playful, educational phonemic awareness and early literacy games and activities to unleash
in this realm!
Another benefit of using the computer as a technology tool is the student-teacher interaction. My classroom
enjoyed viewing the activities on a larger screen and working with one another to answer questions. As the teacher, I
enjoyed being more engaged with the children as we played the games, since they were relying more on my instruction
than if they had been playing individually on the iPad or Leap Pads. This allowed me to answer any questions or confusion
more readily, whereas on the iPad children sometimes just “guess” until the answer is correct. I also enjoyed the
flashplayer capabilities and overall speed using the laptop . Furthermore, the computer screen is much bigger and allows
the students and I to view the activity with more clarity, providing a much better visual stimulus .
IN CONCLUSION, I THINK THAT THE COMPUTER WILL BE A USEFUL TOOL IN OUR CLASSROOM, AND WILL ALLOW
FOR INDEPENDENT PLAY AS WELL AS SMALL GROUP INTERACTIVE LEARNING. AS THE INSTRUCTOR, THE COMPUTER ALLOWS ME
TO MONITOR AND CONTROL THE LEARNING EXPERIENCE MORE READILY, AND EXPANDS THE REALM OF ACTIVITY POSSIBILITIES. I
AM INTERESTED IN WORKING MORE ON VOICE RECORDING, CREATING OUR OWN CARTOONS OR ANIMATED “SHORTS” (MOVIES)
AND “PUBLISHING” OUR OWN STORY BOOKS USING SELF-RECORDED AUDIO STORY TELLING.
I PLAN TO INTEGRATE COMPUTER-BASED GAMES INTO MY CURRENT CURRICULUM 2-3 TIMES PER WEEK, USING SMALL GROUP
INSTRUCTION.

17. Essay for Final Credit Requirements
• Write a succinct three page essay about what you have learned, how you will apply the
knowledge, and reflect on how the CCSS is designed to increase student success.
I am truly impressed with the amount of academic knowledge and applicable instruction skills gained
through this course. At the beginning of the course, I had a rather limited understanding of Phonemic
Awareness and was unsure as to whether or not one class could train me thoroughly enough for me
to feel comfortable instructing or assessing Phonemic Awareness professionally (or even privately,
with my own children!).
• •Fortunately, the education and resources I have received during this course have exceeded my
expectations. The excellent resources, readings, instruction and insightful class discussions have
allowed me to acquire a confident level of understanding on the topics of Phonemic Awareness, the
Common Core Standards and the development of early language and literacy skills in general.
• In fact, I am not only confident that I have developed a solid foundation on early reading development,
but I am eager to learn more! The phonemic awareness activities we learned about in class were so
readily accessible and developmentally appropriate for my “class” that I have already integrated PA instruction
into the class curriculum and my family‟s daily routine.

18. Essay for Final Credit Requirements
• Interestingly, as soon as we started to learn about the various skills involved in the development of phonemic
awareness, I was able to apply it into our daily schedule in small but significant improvements in my student‟s
PA skills has already been observed!
• I think that the CCSS is designed to increase the student‟s success by aiding the teacher in the instructional
process. As discussed in the Yopp & Yopp (2000) article, the most effective method of teaching phonemic
awareness includes intentional and deliberate instruction. The CCSS provide the foundation for me to build up
my program and helps me to maintain the focus of the activity/PA skill at hand.
• PHONEMIC AWARENESS & AUDIO TECHNOLOGY
• Phonemic Awareness is the ability to think consciously about and perform mental operations on speech sound
units such as segmenting, blending, deleting, and changing order of speech-sound sequences. In addition,
Phonemic Awareness contributes tour knowledge of how words and sentences are formed, and that spoken
words or syllables can be thought of as a sequence of phonemes.
• I think that the audio recording element offered in a wide variety of language apps available through iTunes will
prove incredibly beneficial to my class curriculum. The auditory element of the speech sound is connected to
the more basic oral motor activity by which the sound is produced.

19. • In addition, for a perfectionist like Mackenzie, voice recording can and should be used to practice, record and
listen to the phonemes located within a word. This feature will also help me to monitor her PA skill level and
advance her accordingly- or provide more direct support if she is struggling to understand a concept.
OTHER PA ACTIVITIES AND SKILLS
• My classroom has already enjoyed many of the activities discussed in our readings, specifically the Yopp &
Yopp article, which gives a great description of each activity based on targeted Phonemic Awareness Skill. My
students and I have laughed our way through every book in the “Hungry Thing” trilogy and had a great time
creating Hungry Thing Puppets and asking for creative and funny nonsense rhyming words for common foods
(sproccoli for broccoli, pettuce for lettuce, etc)
RESOURCES & REFERENCES
• In conclusion, I think that one of the best features of the entire course was presenting us, the students, will
various online resources. The amount of information and activities available online is phenomenal, and I feel
more comfortable assessing which activities are safe & sound based on my reference back to the Common
Core Standards for Pre-K and even Kindergarten!
• Thank you!
Essay for Final Credit Requirements