Phonemic Awareness Strategies in Teaching Reading in Kindergarten

Abstract

Phonemic Awareness is not as new to the field of literacy as some may think, although it is only in recent years that it has gained attention. For over 50 years, discussions have continued regarding the relationship between a child’s awareness of the sounds of spoken words and his or her ability to read. The research deals with the teacher’s effectiveness in using phonemic awareness strategies to teach kindergarten reading. The study used a questionnaire as the main instrument in gathering data; total enumeration and descriptive research were employed. The participants were 50 kindergarten teachers from La Trinidad, Benguet. The study showed the effect of strategies and utilization of the strategies along the variables. It can be said that teaching in kindergarten requires a strong ability of teachers to process the features of reading to accommodate the learner's different levels of phonemic awareness. However, many challenges will need to be addressed while they do this in the process.