Phonemic Awareness Instruction: Contribution of Articulatory Segmentation to Novice Beginners' Reading and Spelling

Abstract

This experiment examined whether kindergartners who were taught to segment words into phonemes either by monitoring articulatory gestures or by manipulating blocks would benefit in their ability to read and spell. Novice beginning readers who could invent partial sound spellings but could not decode new words were assigned randomly to three groups. The mouth treatment group learned to position pictures to depict the sequence of articulatory gestures in words. The ear treatment group learned to position blocks to depict the sequence of sounds in words. A no-treatment control group received no special instruction. Results revealed that both types of phonemic awareness instruction were effective in teaching phonemic segmentation and in enhancing children's ability to spell the sounds in words even though letters were not used during training. However, only articulatory instruction enhanced processes that enabled children to read words. Our interpretation is that awareness of articulatory gestures facilitates the activation of graphophonemic connections that helps children identify written words and secure them in memory.