Which phonics skill do you teach after letter recognition and letter sounds? My answer is phoneme isolation, also known as identifying the beginning, middle, or ending sound (phoneme) in a CVC word. While this is a phonemic awareness skill, I've found great success with tying phonemic awareness into my daily phonics lessons. Here is everything you need to know to teach phoneme isolation and help your students blend CVC words faster than ever.
What is phoneme isolation?
Phoneme isolation is identifying specific phonemes (or sounds) in a word. You can practice phoneme isolation by identifying the beginning, middle, or ending sounds in a word. For example, you say the word “pat”. If you ask students to identify the beginning sound in the word “pat”, they would say the /p/ sound. This is one of the very first phonemic awareness skills that your students will learn!
Teaching phoneme isolation is the first step to learning how to spell. Once students can identify the beginning, middle, and ending sounds in a CVC word, they can segment the word and spell it, sound-by-sound. To learn more about oral segmenting, you can read this blog post here: Oral Segmentation
When do you teach phoneme isolation?
Phoneme isolation is one of the very first phonemic awareness skills you will teach. In the Kindergarten Phonemic Awareness Daily Warm-Ups, you will practice identifying the initial sound in a word in Week 1. This is a skill that some of your students will learn in Pre-K, and the rest should master at the beginning of Kindergarten.
During the first 6 weeks of school, we work on letter recognition and letter sounds. Phonemic Awareness is an important piece of our phonics instruction, which is why I spend about 8 weeks focusing on phoneme isolation after they have mastered letters and sounds. Once students have finished the 8 weeks of identifying beginning, middle, and ending sounds, we move on to CVC words. Through using this approach, my students have always been able to orally blend and decode CVC words by December, and are able to spell CVC words shortly after. You can read more about my phonics curriculum which ties in phonological and phonemic awareness for well-rounded phonics instruction.
Step-by Step How to Model Phoneme Isolation
How do you introduce phoneme isolation to your students? At first, it will be a lot of modeling and cueing for your students to figure out the beginning sound of a word. To watch a video of this in action, you can find an example of the Phonemic Awareness Daily Warm-Up video here. Skip to 1:53 to watch me explain how to isolate phonemes.
Using Songs to Help Teach Phoneme Isolation
Since you will want to focus on the oral skill of phoneme isolation first, playing phonemic awareness songs is one of my go-to lesson activity ideas.
Some of my favorites are:
To find these songs and more, I have a whole YouTube playlist here, full of songs that practice identifying sounds in words. Find it here: Beginning and Ending Sounds YouTube Playlist
Phoneme Isolation Lesson Activities to Try
Once your students are able to orally isolate the beginning, middle, or ending phoneme in a word, then you can start matching the beginning sound to the letter it represents. Here are 2 of my favorite beginning sound activities to use in a whole group phonics lesson with Kindergarten students.
1. Four Corners
A simple, last-minute phonics activity to practice phoneme isolation is this 4 corners game. All you have to do is put up four signs, each with a different letter, around the classroom. Say a word that begins with one of those sounds and have a few students find that letter. You can do one student at a time, or a group of students. It's a great way to get your students up and moving!
2. Beginning, Middle, or Ending Sound Picture Sort
Phonics picture sorts are my favorite way to practice phoneme isolation. You can use it with beginning, middle, or ending sounds, and later- by word family, digraph, or long vowel pattern! I like to use it in a pocket chart, but you can put it up on the board using magnets, or sort it on a table if you do this in a small group activity. Students will look at the picture, isolate the phoneme, then sort the picture under the letter it starts with. You can find the beginning sound picture sort in the centers pack here: Beginning and Ending Phonics Centers (There is also one available as a separate resource here: Beginning Sound Picture Sort
Phoneme Isolation Center Activities to Try
1. Magnetic Letters Matching Mats
I love using manipulatives like magnetic letters in my phonics center activities! With this activity, students will match the letter to the beginning sound that the picture starts with. You don't have to use a cookie sheet, any tray will work! You can find this activity here: Beginning and Ending Sound Magnetic Matching Mats.
2. Clip Cards
One way to strengthen those fine motor skills is by using clothespins! (You can also easily use paper clips for this activity.) Clip cards are a quick and easy low-prep center activity. In this activity, students will clip the correct beginning or ending sound. You can find this activity in the Beginning and Ending Sounds Center Activities pack.
3. Sort by Color
Who doesn't love to color? This sort-by-color activity is a great way to practice sorting without cutting and pasting. Students will use the color code at the top to color each picture by beginning or ending sound. You can find this worksheet in the Beginning and Ending Sounds Phonics Worksheets here.
You can grab a free sample here:
Find all these activities included in the Kindergarten Phonics Beginning and Ending Sounds Unit
If you are teaching beginning and ending sounds and need some help planning your phonics lessons and center activities, Iβve done it all for you! You can find the Kindergarten Phonics Beginning and Ending Sounds Unit here. It includes everything you need to teach phoneme isolation for 4 weeks including pre-made lesson plans, phonemic awareness warm-ups, anchor charts, assessments, centers, worksheets, and more.
Once you complete the Beginning and Ending Sounds Unit, you can move on to the Short Vowels and Middle Sounds Phonics Unit.
Let me know what activities you are going to try to help your students master phoneme isolation!
