So informative!

• Phonemic Awareness: Before introducing phonics, students often engage in phonemic awareness activities. This involves recognizing and manipulating individual sounds (phonemes) in spoken words. Phonemic awareness lays the foundation for phonics by helping students understand the segmental nature of spoken language.

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• Letter-Sound Relationships: Phonics instruction starts with teaching students the basic sound-letter relationships. For example, students learn that the letter "m" represents the sound /m/ as in "mat," and the letter "s" represents the sound /s/ as in "sun."

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• Blending: Once students have a grasp of individual letter sounds, they learn how to blend those sounds together to read words. For instance, they learn to blend the sounds /c/, /a/, and /t/ to read the word "cat."

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• Segmenting: Students also learn how to segment words into individual sounds. This skill is important for spelling. For example, they learn to segment the word "dog" into the sounds /d/, /o/, and /g/.

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• Decoding: As students progress, they practice using their phonics knowledge to decode unfamiliar words while reading. By applying their understanding of letter-sound relationships, they can read words they've never encountered before.

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• Word Recognition: With continued practice, students become more proficient at recognizing common letter patterns, such as digraphs (two letters representing one sound) and blends (consonant clusters), which help them read more complex words.

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• Spelling: Phonics instruction also aids spelling skills. When students understand the phonetic structure of words, they can more accurately spell words based on their sounds.

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• Word Families and Patterns: Students may learn about word families (e.g., words that share the same ending sound, like "cat," "bat," "hat") and spelling patterns (e.g., the silent "e" rule or the different ways to make the long "e" sound).

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• Phonics Rules: In addition to basic sound-letter relationships, students may learn various phonics rules, like when to use "c" or "k," or how to handle vowel sounds in different situations.