I had a parent ask me today, “My son’s first grade teacher just told me in our conversation that he lacks phonics skills, he lacks phonetic skills , he lacks phonemic awareness and he lacks phonological awareness. Are these all the same thing? Can you give me a simple definition of the difference between phonics and phonemic awareness that I can understand?”
Any one have a suggestion for me to tell her?
“Phonics” is anything to do with sounds of words. A worksheet where I”m supposed to circle all the pictures of things that begin with the /k/ sound would be a “phonics” worksheet. If a kiddo has phonetic skills, he’ll be able to do that - by saying the word that describes the picture to himself and listening for that sound at the beginning of the word
However, if the kid isn’t even aware of those beginning sounds and ending sounds and what have you — and may be completely able to say the word and understand it, but just knows what the whole word means, doesn’t hear those little pieces — he’s lacking in phonemic awareness. This means that when you *tell* him to circle the words that begin with the C, he will probably try to visualize how that word is spelled, and if the first letter is C, he’ll circle it. This means a kiddo with a good visual memory for words (some kids could remember pictures a whole lot better; others can remember those symbol details) may look like he’s doing fine on ye olde phonics worksheet — but is fundamentally clueless as far as the phonics skills really go. He’ll do fine for a while ‘cause he’ll remember that “cup” goes with that picture of a cup, and the word “cup,” but he won’t make the connection that “cut” — which is a lot harder to make a picture of — is almost the same, but you change the last sound. THe girl next to him with phonemic awareness and phonics skills will, without even thinking about it.
http://www.auburn.edu/~murraba/ has a lot of really good info about phonics, phonemic awareness, etc. and things to do to help, since unfortunately you can *not* depend on the schools to take the time and effort to get the kiddo on track.