You've just learned a bit about the progression of skills that occurs as a student develops phonemic awareness. Now, let's turn our attention to supporting this skill through instruction. As you watch the screencast, consider how each of these strategies supports students to identify, segment, and manipulate phonemes.

Strategy Spotlight: Phonemic Blending & Segmenting

To build your understanding of how to support phonemic awareness in a one-on-one or small-group setting, you'll watch a teacher in action. As you engage, consider: What strategies does the teacher use to teacher deepen students' knowledge of how to segment and blend words?

Click here to check your understanding.

Apply Your Learning!

Now, apply your learning! In this activity, you will learn how to use Elkonin boxes, also sometimes known as "sound boxes," to teach phonemic awareness skills. First, watch the video example. Then engage in the activities below and practice utilizing Elkonin boxes on your own.

Practice #1

The next word is “pack.” Say “pack."
Count the number of phonemes in the word “pack."
Move one tile into each box for each sound you hear.
Point to the box that represents the sound /ck/.
Remove the tile that represents /ck/.
Replace the /ck/ tile with /d/. Blend the sounds and say the new word.
Remove the tile that represents /a/.
Change /a/ to /o/ and put a new tile in its place. Blend the sounds and say the new word.
Add an /s/ sound to the end of the word. Blend the sounds and say the new word.

Elkonin Boxes

Now, click here to reveal a video that demonstrates the activity above.

Practice #2

The next word is “pin.” Say “pin.”
Count the number of phonemes in the word “pin.”
Move one tile into each box for each sound you hear.
Point to the box that represents the sound /p/.
Remove the tile that represents /p/.
Change /p/ to /ch/ and put a new tile in its place.
Now blend those sounds, pointing to the boxes as you say the sounds.
Repeat the process changing /n/ to /p/.

Elkonin Boxes

Now, click here to reveal a video that demonstrates the activity above.

Key Idea: Phonemic awareness should be taught by providing abundant opportunities for students to practice hearing, identifying, deleting, and manipulating the phonemes in words without the presence of print.

EL Education. (2016). K-2 skills block: Phonemic blending and segmentation. Retrieved from https://vimeo.com/159245835.