Phonemic Awareness 

 
Hello! Our names are​ Ms. Phillips​ and​ Ms. Gillette​. We both have 
graduated from SUNY Cortland Inclusive Education Program and we 
are here to help with multiple phonemic awareness tasks. We are both 
looking forward to helping make the future phonemically aware, and 
we are going to help by giving some caretaker tips down below on ​Sound Blending, Sound 
Categorization, and Sound Identity.​ Phonemic awareness is the ability to hear and 
manipulate the sound of English. The development of phonemic awareness is an important 
goal for children starting in kindergarten. 
Prepared by Ms. Phillips and Ms. Gillette 

Sound Blending-​ ​Sound blending is where a student must be able to manipulate 

individual Sounds by combining them to form a word.  

Tip for Caretaker on sound blending:​ ​You stand in front of all of the children and begin 
to sound out the word you are thinking of. For example say /c/, /a/, /t/. Students should 
be allowed to guess as soon as they have a guess on what the word is. This will promote 
their phonemic awareness in sound blending. Once this becomes very easy for students 
to do, try scrambling up the different sounds in the word on paper and see if they can 
put the word together by just having the sounds.   

Sound Categorization-​Sound categorization is where the student is challenged to 

recognize a word that does not share the same beginning, middle, or ending sound as 
two other words.  

Tips for Caretaker on sound categorization: ​You present three words to all the 
children that have a different sound either at the beginning, middle, or the end of the 
word. These words can be presented in any way that will best support the students (ex: 
typed, written on a white board, spoken).  

Example words: ​Skip, Tip, Skirt​. Which one doesnt belong because it ends with a 
different sound than the other two? The students should answer ​skirt​ because the other 
two words end with /​p​/.  

1   
Sound Identity-​Sound identity is when the student must show that he or she is able to 
recognize the same sound when it appears in different words. 

Tips for Caretaker on sound identity: ​Similar to sound categorization except instead of 
knowing what sound is different the students should recognize what sound is the same. 
You can give the students three words that all share the same sound at the beginning, 
middle, or end. 

Example words: ​lake, light, low.​ What sound do all three of these words have in 
common? Students should answer with /​l/​ .  

Other Activities and games: 

Here are various other activities and educational videos for you and your student. 

Here you can find various games for phonemic development. 

Citations: 
Fountas, I. C., & Pinnell, G. S. (2018). ​Literacy beginnings: A prekindergarten handbook​. 
Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. 

Phonological awareness: Instructional and assessment guidelines​. (n.d.). Retrieved March 

16, 2021, from ​http://www.ldonline.org/article/6254/ 

Reading Rockets(2004). Phonemic Awareness Assessment. 

https://www.readingrockets.org/article/phonemic-awareness-assessment 

Zarillo, J. (2007). Are You Prepared to Teach Reading?. Pearson Education Inc. 

2