Students’ Phonemic Awareness Affects Reading Accuracy

王子莫

【中圖分类号】H319 【文献标识码】A 【文章编号】2095-3089（2019）08-0116-03

1.Introduction

When I worked as a primary English teacher in a private English cram institution， there were very common phenomena that many students refused to remember English words. It is a difficult task for them to tell their parents to dictate words. Then their parents just told me that the student didn？蒺t know how to read the words. I inferred that if the students didn？蒺t know how to read the words， they wouldn？蒺t write the correct words let alone to remember them， which will be an contributor to their weaker reading ability. While it is phonemic awareness that plays an important role in reading every word clearly. The relationship between phonemic awareness and learning to read is extremely important （Stanovich， 1994）. In fact， recent research suggests that phonemic awareness may be the “most important core and causal factor separating normal and disabled readers” （Adams， 1990， p. 305）. “Many of the worlds writing system， including English， are alphabetic. In these systems there is an attempt to have one letter to represent each sound. Even though no language uses a writing system that has a complete one-to-one correspondence between letters and sounds， all alphabetic systems follow the general principle that each letter in a word represents one of its sounds.”（David E. Freeman and Yvonne S. Freeman， 2014）. But actually it is not easy for teachers to help students to improve their phonetic awareness because the insight that words are composed of smaller units （i.e.， phonemes） may be difficult for some children to grasp due to this abstract units of language—phonemes. While phonemic awareness skill enables children to use letter-sound correspondences to read and spell words.

2.Literature Review

Children vary in how well they can manipulate and make judgments about the phonemic segments of speech. This variation in phonemic awareness affects reading and spelling skills， as has been shown by correlational studies （e.g.， Fox & Routh， 1980； Liberman， Shankweiler， Fischer， & Carter， 1974）， predictive studies （Bradley & Bryant， 1983； Bryant， Bradley， Maclean， & Crossland， 1989）， and training studies （Bradley & Bryant， 1983； Byrne & Fielding-Barnsley， 1989， 1990； Williams， 1980）. The relationship between phonemic awareness and learning to read is extremely important （Stanovich， 1994）. In fact， recent research suggests that phonemic awareness may be the “most important core and causal factor separating normal and disabled readers” （Adams， 1990， p. 305）.

While many people may feel confused the concepts between phonological awareness and phonemic awareness. There are different concepts between phonological awareness and phonemic awareness. phonological awareness is the ability to hear sounds that make up words in spoken language. This includes recognizing words that rhyme， deciding whether words begin or end with the same sounds， understanding that sounds can be manipulated to create new words， and separating words into their individual sounds. （http：//www.reading-tutors.com）

Phonemic awareness is the awareness that speech stream consists of a sequence of sounds-specifically phonemes， the smallest unit of sound that makes a difference in communication. （Griffith，P.L.， &Olson， M. W. 2000）. The awareness that the speech stream is made up of a sequence of small units of sound and the ability to manipulate those small units-phonemic awareness-appears to be critical for readers of am alphabetic orthography. （Griffith，P.L.， &Olson， M. W. 2000）. However， phonemic awareness is not synonymous with phonics. It is not learning spelling-to-sound correspondences， and it is not sounding out words. It is an understanding of the structure of spoken language. In fact， it is unlikely that children lacking phonemic awareness can benefit fully from phonics instruction （Juel， Griffith， & Gough， 1986）

The reason why we must pay attention to phonemic awareness is that the English spelling system often fails to represent the sounds of English in a simple manner. In other words， there is often no one？鄄to？鄄one correspondence between the sounds that we hear and the letters we see on a page. The main reason that spellings do not always match sounds is that after conventional spellings were established， pronunciation continued to change. （David E. Freeman and Yvonne S. Freeman， 2014）.

3.Method

3.1Participants

The participants of the study were 4 male and 4 female third grade students from 2 classes. To select the participants， a survey of students willingness was conducted in advance. Then， reading rate and accuracy tests were conducted twice to 19 students from class A and 16 students from class B. From the students who improved their reading rate and accuracy under average， some students were omitted because they have already had better reading rate and accuracy than others or they didnt perform well when they read the story. Based on the reading rate and students performance， 2 male students and 2 female students were selected from each class.

3.2 Time

This study consisted of four 20-minute reading recovery lessons in all， and the study covered the period from May 5 to May 26 in 2017. Every Friday learners met teachers in an elementary school in Xinzhu. Before the reading recovery lessons， a test of students reading rate was assessed on May 4.

3.3 Materials

Total five books were used for four weeks reading recovery lessons. Three books were from website www.readinga-z.com from level A-C， and they are I Go， This Turtle and What Can We Draw？ respectively. The other two are picture books.

Table1： reading materials

Every time students had five minutes to learn new phonemes and to be assessed the reading accuracy of story books they had learned separately. Students were tested by reading the story book they have learned， at the same time teacher recorded the word that they read incorrectly in every sentence. Table two shows the target phonemes the students learned.

Table2： target phonemes

4.The Results

According to the performance of students ， the results showed that ⑴Most of students read the whole story book without the intonation change. ⑵Compared to What can we draw？ and Not A Box， students performed better in reading I Go and This Turtle. ⑶After several weeks study， their interests in reading English story books were improved. ⑷Actually， in the book of Not A Box， they skipped many words.

The table 3 shows the common words they usually read incorrectly.

Table3： the common words they usually read incorrectly

5.Discussion

In the story book of I Go， the students read “room” as “loom” because they didn？蒺t know how to pronounce the letter ‘r. At the very beginning， I couldn？蒺t understand this phenomenon. The students studied han yu pin yin in the primary school in my hometown .Among the consonant of Chinese syllable the letter “r” pronounced as the Chinese character “日” just with different tone. But in Taiwan the primary students studied 注音符號 so they are not very familiar with the letter ‘r which the students in Chinese mainland learned in han yu pin yin. While in the English word room， it is sounded like “惹”. So although they usually wont read room as loom ， most of primary students in the Chinese mainland read the word room incorrectly. Some of them read “room”/ rum/ as /r ？蘧 m/. Actually， double 'o' pronounced as short vowel sounds /u/， but the students maybe unfamiliar with this rule.

In the story book of This Turtle， They read the letter ‘i in the word digging /i/ as / a？覦/， which represents the pronunciation of the original letter rather than in the specific word. Usually they read funny /'f？蘧ni/ as fanny / 'f？覸ni/， maybe they couldn？蒺t make distinguish pronunciations between /？蘧/ and /？覸/.

In the story book of Not A Box， students read all the word beginning with the letters th as the sound /？奩？藜/， such as that， this. Maybe they thought all of these words are pronounced the same.

In the story book of What Can We Draw？ ⑴the students read “fluffy”/'fl？蘧fi/ as “fly”/fla？覦/ or “flee” /fli /. When they read /fla？覦/， maybe because “fluffy” is a new word but they found the familiar letters contained in it ‘f， ‘l， ‘y， they made speculation that it should pronounced the same as the word “fly”. When they read /fli/， maybe because they just know the letter ‘f pronounced as /f/ and the letter ‘l pronounced as /l/.

⑵students read the word rain/ re？覦 n/ as ring / r？覦 ？覧/because they didn？蒺t distinguish /？覧/ and /n/./n/， and /？覧/ are nasal consonants. Both of them are voiced. Among them， /n/ is alveolar while /？覧/ is velar. The /n/ by stopping the air at the alveolar ridge is produced in the same places as the stop /d/. The /？耷/ by blocking off the velar area is produced in the same places as the stop /g/， which is a sound that is usually spelled ng ， and the character looks like an n and a g combined. The sound occurs only at the end of syllables， such as in the word ring.

And another reason， Maybe it is because they didnt know how to distinguish between /ei/ and /i. / the /ei/ sound， as in the words they， make and great. /ei/ is a diphthongs sound which means it's combination of two vowel sounds. They pronounce within the same syllable. The /ei/ sound is a combination of the /e/ sound and the /i/ sound /ei/. Like vowels the diphthongs or make your mouth and they are voiced which means you break your vocal cords to make a sound. unlike with the vowel and the consonant， when you pronounce the diphthong your mouth will change position and shape as you say the sound this because their combination of two vowel sounds like is it so as you say /ei/， your mouth will start on the position of the /e/ sound and finish on the position of the /i/ sound .In this case， both these sound as we call unrounded so we keep our lips stretch out like smiling but the mouth was closed a little as we move the /e/ to the /i/ sound.

the /i/ sound， as in the words in， it and with. It is a vowel sound. As its technical name， it is a near-close near-front unrounded vowel. Remember it keeps the pronunciation physical and its name tell us about how the sound made physical. In this case， your tongue is closed to the top and front of your mouth unrounded to your lips because their stretch out like smiling and unrounded. All vowels make through the mouth and voiced you need to break your vocal cord to make the sound.

⑶the letter ‘a in the words both fat /f？覸t / and rat / r？覸t / was pronounced as /ɑ：/ because students were influenced by the sound of the familiar words such as： after﹑afternoon﹑ask﹑answer﹑bath﹑bathroom﹑can？蒺t﹑class﹑dance﹑fast﹑glass﹑father﹑tomato. The letter ‘a included in all of the words with underline was pronounced as /ɑ：/ in American English. They didn？蒺t know the rule that letter ‘a in stressed closed syllable pronounced as /？覸/ rather than /ɑ：/. 6.Conclusion

One of the things we have learned about phonemic awareness is that it plays a very selective， although necessary， role in the reading acquisition process. While phonemic awareness is not needed to speak or understand language， it plays a critical role in learning skills requiring the manipulation of phonemes-specifically word recognition and spelling.

As the beginner of English language， it is important for the primary school students to learn the standard pronunciation. Also， teachers as instructor should pay more attention to give instructions on the specific phonemes because some of them just have the subtle difference which always exert negative influence on the students？蒺 English learning. Teachers could also provide the students with activities—word games， rhymes， riddles， and songs， which could not only improve their learning interests but also correct their pronunciation.

7.Suggestion

In the process of analyzing the words which students usually read incorrectly， I found some interesting topics that could be studied further. ⑴ Does mother tongue have a negative or positive influence on target language study？ Will u think of the difference between Chinese character and kanji？ ⑵ Why they find the letter “l” instead of other letters to replace the letter “r”？ Maybe it is because both ‘l and ‘r have the same place of articulation and they all belong to alveolar.⑶Do you think the problem that students read singular words as plural or vice versa also belong to lacking phonemic awareness？ Actually， this problem maybe reflect the interplay between the first language and the second language. In Chinese， there is no difference between singular words and plural words. For example： “我有一臺车子” “我有许多台车子”， in the second sentence， we neednt add ‘s to demonstrate the plural meaning.

8.Limitations

⑴I couldnt search more paper to classify the errors which students made due to time limitation and some of explainations that I provided to describe the reason why students read the specific word incorrectly need more evidence. ⑵The sample is very limited. When I am back to my hometown， I will collect more data to make analysis.

Reference：

[1]Admas，M.J.（1990）. Beginning to read： Thinking and learning about print. Cambridge， MA： MIT Press.

[2]Byrne， B.，&Fielding-Barnsley， R.（1993）. Evaluation of a program to teach phonemic awareness to young children： A 1-year follow-up. Journal of Education Psychology，85， 104-111.

[3]David E. Freeman & Yvonne S. Freeman（2014）. Essential Linguistics（2nd ed.）

[4]Griffith， P.L.， &Olson，M.W.（1992）.Phonemic awareness helps beginning readers break the code. The Reading Teacher， 45. 516-523.

[5]Justine﹠Brian﹠Monica﹠Amy（2017）. Reading Recovery（term paper）.

[6]Yopp， H.K.（1995）. Read-aloud books for developing phonemic awareness： An annotated bibliography. The Reading Teacher， 48， 538-542.

[7]Yopp， H.K.（2000）. Supporting phonemic awareness development in the classroom. The Reading Teacher， 54， 130-143.