I’m Not Sure About this Phoneme…

Sometimes when teaching phonics, we are unsure about the exact pronunciation of the phoneme.  That is OK, as long as we know how to research its pronunciation.  Additionally, sometimes we can’t think of a great student centered activity for our students to practice the phonemes in class.  That is OK too, because there are resources available online, if you can find them.  LINUS students can also benefit from these resources.  Most schools are focusing on LINUS these days, so I want to share some activities that are suitable supplements to the new LINUS curriculum.  In this blog post, I want to share some online resources with you that may be beneficial for your any of your phonics and LINUS classes.

Pronunciation

Oxford Learners Dictionaries

http://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/

This website is very handy because you can search for any word and it gives you a lot of information:

1.       British English (BrE) and North American (NAmE) pronunciation

2.       International Phonetic Alphabet spelling

3.       Definition, Part of Speech, Homophones/Homonyms/Homographs

4.       Idioms, Phrasal Verbs

* Useful for looking up pronunciation of words

Phonemic Chart – British Council

http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/phonemic-chart

This website has an interactive phonemic chart, and is also useful for looking up correct pronunciation of phonemes.  Please note that you need to know the IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) spelling of the phoneme (or else use trial-and-error until you find the correct one).

Activities

Sparkle Box

http://www.sparklebox.co.uk/literacy/alphabet/phoneme-collections/#.U6oaN_mSzT8

This website has many activities for phonics available for free download.  They are organized by phoneme, and have both individual and group activities.

Pattie’s Activities

http://teams.lacoe.edu/documentation/classrooms/patti/k-1/activities/phonemic.html

This website has lots of fun games and activities relating to phonics segmenting and blending.

Reading Rockets

http://www.readingrockets.org/article/377

This website has lesson plans and games to increase phonemic awareness.

Sue McCandish, DECS 2006

http://www.decd.sa.gov.au/northernadelaide/files/links/Phonological_Awareness_Bo.pdf

This is a link to a document by Sue McCandish.  She is a speech pathologist and has collated this document to provide interactive activities for children with speech impediments.  However, her activities are perfect for phonics classes.  Please take a look.  The document is available for free download.

I hope you find these resources useful.  I know it is tough to ask someone how to pronounce a phoneme or what are some suitable activities for phonics, but with the right tools, you can find the information quickly and easily online.

-Sarah Higgs, Jempol