Phonemic Awareness vs. Phonological Awareness

As you learn more about reading development and instruction you may come upon two terms that look quite similar: phonological awareness and phonemic awareness. While the two are often used interchangeably there are slight distinctions between them.

Phonological Awareness

Phonological awareness is the ability to recognize that words are made up of a variety of sound units. The term encompasses a number of sound related skills necessary for a person to develop as a reader. As a child develops phonological awareness she not only comes to understand that words are made up of small sound units (phonemes). She also learns that words can be segmented into larger sound “chunks” known as syllables and each syllable begin with a sound (onset) and ends with another sound (rime).

Phonological awareness provides the basis for phonics. Phonics, the understanding that sounds and print letters are connected, is the first step towards the act we call reading.

When measuring a child’s phonological awareness look at his ability to apply several different skills. A child with strong phonological awareness should be able to recognize and use rhyme, break words into syllables, blend phonemes into syllables and words, identify the beginning and ending sounds in a syllable and see smaller words within larger words (ie. “cat” in “catalog”).

Phonemic Awareness

While phonemic awareness also involves an understanding of the ways that sounds function in words, it deals with only one aspect of sound: the phoneme. A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound in a language that holds meaning. Almost all words are made up of a number of phonemes blended together. Consider the word “ball”. It is made up of three phonemes: /b/ /aw/ /l/ . Each of its sounds affects the meaning. Take away the /b/ sound and replace it with /w/ and you have an entirely different word. Change the /aw/ for an /e/ sound and again the meaning changes.

Phonemic awareness is just one aspect of phonological awareness. While phonological awareness encompasses a child’s ability to recognize the many ways sounds function in words, phonemic awareness is only her understanding of the most minute sound units in words. Because phonemic awareness is a sub-skill under the phonological awareness “umbrella” not all of the measures for determining a reader’s skill level are applied when assessing it. A reader with strong phonemic awareness will demonstrate the ability to hear rhyme and alliteration (the repetition of the same consonant sound at the beginning of several different words used in a sentence or paragraph), find the different sound in a set of words (ie. “bat”, “ball”, “wet”) and blend and segment phonemes.

Using These Two Terms

Though there is a distinction between phonological awareness and phonemic awareness the two terms are often used interchangeably. For the most part both are used to refer to what is technically phonological awareness. The more common term used to encompass both skill sets is phonemic awareness. In most literature on reading you will see “phonemic awareness” used. Know when you see this term usually the writer is actually referring to “phonological awareness”.

Phonological Awareness

Phonological Awareness

Phonology is the study of the sounds that form spoken human language, and phonological awareness is believed to be one of the cognitive crucibles that enables a person to acquire or learn not only spoken language, but also, later, reading and writing ability. It is the measurable awareness or attention to distinguish and manipulate each different unit of sound. The actual mental representation of a sound’s structure is not addressed, in part because according to prevailing theory, is this is a purely physical or neurological function that develops very early in life. Awareness is a metalinguistic skill involving conscious effort to evaluate and restructure recognized sounds.
Research in phonological awareness is often approached from three structures of the sound of language. The first of these is the basic building block called a phoneme, the smallest segmental unit of sound, such as consonants and vowels. Words are formed with the sequential blending of two or more phonemes.
When multiple phonemes come together, there is a structure to their combined sound commonly described as its three sequential components: the onset, a nucleus, and ending coda. The nucleus and coda together constitutes a rhyme, also termed rime in linguistic studies. The ability to hear, recognize, generate and speak onset and rime sounds is a strong marker for healthy phonological awareness.
The combined onset, nucleus and coda usually forms a syllable, a unit of speech sound that is not only the building block of words, but also that of a fully fledged language. Any language can be characterized by the rhythm and phonetic nature of its syllabic possibilities. All languages develop in complexity of expression in part through increasingly polysyllabic words. The ability to identify and segment syllables is considered critical to language development, a system of stringing words together to communicate a thought.
For most children, phonological awareness begins at 3 years of age and rapidly develops in the subsequent two years. The universal progression appears to be from larger to smaller sound units, from syllables to phonemes. Furthermore, there appears to be a natural developmental progression of complexity of processing, from identification of a sound to its manipulation. There is a reason children are exposed to nursery rhymes and rhythmic songs at an early age. Phonological awareness is relevant to educational psychology and therapies for speech disorders.
Dyslexia is a broad class of learning and literacy dysfunctions believed to commonly affect five to ten percent of the general population. It is characterized by a wide variety of symptoms and its underlying cause is theorized by an equally varied range of explanations. One of these is the phonological deficit hypothesis, which postulates that dyslexics have an impairment with sound recognition and manipulation. This affects auditory memory and recall for rapid processing of both speech and the decoding of graphic letter symbols into sounds.
Although its popularity as a teaching method for literacy has waxed and waned over many years, the curriculum for children, both normal and developmentally delayed, called “phonics” remains popular. Based on phonemic awareness only, it emphasizes the mastery of matching alphabetic letters and learning the rules of spelling to effectively read and write. In line with the general principles of phonological awareness, it is the learning of language as sound, separate from its meaning and comprehension.

Auditory Discrimination

Auditory Discrimination

Auditory discrimination refers to the brain's ability to organize and make sense of language sounds. Children with auditory discrimination difficulties might have trouble understanding and developing language skills because their brains either misinterpret language sounds, or process them too slowly. Often, these children cannot differentiate between similar sounds, or they are unable to recognize language in certain situations.
Language is made up of phonemes. A phoneme is the smallest possible sound in a word, and is not necessarily related to spelling. For example, the word "night" has three phonemes: the "n" sound, the "eye" sound, and the "t" sound. When we listen to language, our brains organize the different sounds into meaningful chunks that we can interpret as words. This is called phonological awareness.
People with auditory discrimination disorders may appear to be deaf or hard of hearing. They might not respond to spoken language if there is background noise, or they might understand sounds incorrectly. Problems with auditory discrimination are usually related to the brain rather than to the ear itself. It means the person can hear, but he or she hears things "wrong." A doctor can diagnose an auditory discrimination disorder after tests have shown there are no physical hearing problems.
Children with auditory discrimination disabilities often fall behind in school, particularly in reading and spelling, because they lack the phonological awareness needed to make relationships between sounds and the symbols that represent them. Sometimes they appear to have speech impediments or a stammer because they cannot accurately produce the language sounds they can't hear properly. These children may also be unable to understand a teacher who is not facing them or addressing them directly, or they will have difficulty picking out language sounds if there is any background noise.
The Wepman's Auditory Discrimination Test (WADT) is an assessment tool that is commonly used to diagnose auditory processing disorders in young children. In this test, a child is seated so that she can't see the examiner. The examiner reads a series of minimal pairs, or words that differ by only one phoneme such as "bit/pit" or "ship/sheep." Some of the pairs of words have no differences, and the child is given a score based on how many pairs she correctly identifies as the same or different. Other tests might involve asking a child to repeat words back to an examiner, or say a word back with a sound missing.

Different Types of Educational Games

Different Types of Educational Games

There are many different types of educational games, but some are more explicitly focused on education than others. While games that are thought to improve general thinking skills are sometimes considered educational games, most people limit this category to games that improve knowledge within a specific subject such as language or math. This means that while games like chess are known to improve logic skills, reasoning, and other traits valued in education, these games are not considered educational. Various types of activities can incorporate educational materials to form games, but flashcard based games and video games are likely the most common.
Many types of educational games take advantage of computers and technology to guide players through information. Games involving facts, analysis, or more basic skills may be integrated into the game in various ways, but these are typically hidden behind an overall plot line. This type of educational game is often highly effective but requires technology that is not available to all people.
Basic games involving flashcards can be used as educational games in a number of ways. Matching games are popular, as are those that involve answering questions. These games are typically differentiated from purely educational activities by prizes or some concept of winning. Other games, like bingo or baseball, can be altered to include educational elements in a classroom setting as well.
Educational games can be as simple or as complex as the designer wishes, but some types of games are more effective at hiding educational content than others. Hiding the educational content is not strictly necessary, but it often helps encourage children to play this type of game compulsively, as a child might play purely recreational games. For example, typing games in which the keyboard is the controller are nearly perfect in the integration of enjoyment with learning, as these games teach a skill. Flashcard games, on the other hand, are often less concealed and therefore less popular.
Reading activities are popular as educational games, and with some computer systems books can actively incorporate side games involving additional learning. Spelling, phonics, and other reading basics can be made part of popular books in order to increase the degree of interaction between the user and the book, creating something similar to a game. In order to hold the reader's interest, some parts of the book may even be animated or resemble more conventional games.
Some traditional games can also be considered educational games. For example, the Japanese game Karuta involves knowledge of a large number of Japanese poems. Games that require knowledge in order to participate, such as trivia games, can often be considered educational if a player watches for long enough or has been given time to prepare in advance, but the teaching through playing aspect present in many other educational games is lost.