Pre-Kindergarten Phonemic Awareness Activities
Before students can tackle the task of reading whole words, they must understand what sounds that the letters that make up these words create in isolation. For many, these lessons begin in preschool with an exploration of phonemics. Teaching your hard-to-keep-captivated pre-kindergarten students these important phonemic awareness lessons is much easier if you select high-interest activities in which pupils are naturally interested.
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Starting Sound Match-Up
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The best place to start when seeking to build phonemic understanding is with the initial sounds of words, as these are often the easiest to recognize immediately. Help your pre-kindergartner build his skill by creating a starting sound match-up game. Select several starting sounds upon which to focus, such as "M" or "B," and gather pictures of objects that start with these sounds. For example, for an "M" sound you could find a picture of milk, a picture of money and a picture of a mustache. Take one picture out of each group and place it in the center of a table or on the floor, then jumble the remaining. Ask your pre-K students to work together to sort these pictures into appropriate piles based upon their starting sounds.
Rhyme Time Activity
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While more challenging than starting sounds, rhyme is also an effective way to help your learners build their lexicons. To engage students in this simple activity, select several words that are easy to pronounce and can pair with many rhyming words. Pig, for example, is a wise choice as children can match it with wig, fig or twig. Write each word on the board. When students arrive in class, read them one word at a time and ask them to call out rhymes. Write the words they call out below the original word, showing the students what those words look like in print. Tell students that if they can come up with a set number of rhyming words they will earn a prize.
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Onomatopoeia Cards
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Help your students learn about sound by studying onomatopoeia words, or words that represent sounds. To prepare for this activity, write or find a story that contains lots of reference to noise, such as car doors slamming, books falling off shelves and creaky staircases. Type out the sounds that students will hear during the story, placing each on a separate sheet of paper. Make one copy of these sound sheets for each student. Before you begin the story, read the words from the sound sheets with your students, showing them what sound each word makes. Tell students to leave these sheets out in front of them and when they hear you say one of the sounds in the story, to hold up the right card. For example, if you get to a part in the story where a giant is walking around, they may hold up their BOOM cards to represent the sound he would make.
Phonemic Movements Dance
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Get your students up and moving with a phonemic dance. To prepare for this activity, have your students help you attach a movement to certain sounds. For example, the students could pair the "S" sound with slithering like a snake and the "C" sound with leaping like a cat. After attaching these movements, have students stand. Read them a story containing these sounds, and ask them to make the movements when they hear them.
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