Chances are, if you have a child in the early elementary grades, you have heard the term "phonemic awareness" during a parent-teacher conference! Especially if your child's teacher has expressed any concern about your child's emerging literacy skills.
And most people who went to school in the United states will remember the "Hooked on Phonics" curriculum. They probably have some sense of that phonics refers to learning to read in some way.
"Phonemic" and "phonics" are related terms which both refer to speech sounds. However, one classifies the awareness of speech sounds, and the other is the application of certain skills when sounding out words.
Phonemic awareness refers to a child's general awareness that words in speech are made up of smaller, individual units of sound. Children with strong phonemic awareness can identify, isolate, and swap around the individual sounds in words to make new words, like going from "lip to "flip" by adding a /f/ sound at the beginning.
Our brains are naturally wired to hear and process whole words as part of oral language. Therefore, when we hear "cat", we naturally hear it as one sound, "cat", and can process the meaning of the spoken word. What is not a natural process, is the ability to hear the individual sounds, also called phonemes, in words, like this: /k/-/a/-/t/. That ability requires an awareness of those phonemic sounds (phonemic awareness), and is something that children must be taught!
Phonics, on the other hand, is the knowledge of the sounds that print letters make, and the practice of applying that knowledge to the task of sounding out words. While most people know that phonics play a big role in early elementary classrooms, many people don't realize that teachers also teach phonemic awareness as part of early literacy curriculum. Children must understand that words are made up of smaller sounds before they can learn how letters spell those sounds.
Learning the connection between letters and sounds (phonics) does not happen without an awareness that words are made up of individual sounds (phonemic awareness). Now you know the difference between phonemic awareness and phonics, and how they go hand in hand!
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