1. Phonological/Phonemic Awareness Curriculum

Our curriculum is based on the following 110 games, arranged in an order that’s research-supported and classroom-proven to lead to successful reading. Each game builds on the skills taught in the previous games, and the children should be confident on each of the previous lessons before they move on to a new lesson. Children who complete this pre-reading curriculum will have a strong foundation for learning to read and will be ready to start a traditional reading curriculum of phonics and sight words. NOTE: Be sure to consult our Before You Start page and our Pacing & Assessment page before you dive in! ↑ Top

1a. Phonological/Phonemic Awareness — Sounds in Language

1b. Phonological/Phonemic Awareness — Sounds in Words

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2. Lessons

Each lesson takes approximately 15 minutes and is most effective when taught to children individually or in small groups (2-5 children). Use your lesson time to present one new game, and possibly devote 5 minutes at the end to review an activity the child has already mastered. More Teaching Tips ↑ Top

3. Confidence Builders & Extensions

Every child is different and will move through our curriculum at a different pace. A child who breezes through the Rhyming games may struggle with Compound Words, while another child will struggle with Rhyming but master the Compound Words activities very quickly. Many of our activity pages feature recommendations for adjusting the activity to the needs of your particular child or classroom:
  • Confidence Builders make the game a little easier for struggling students.
  • Extensions offer extra challenges for children who have already mastered the main activity.
  • Variations suggest options for changing up the game a little to add variety.
  • Group Variations offer tips for scaling up from an individual child to a group of children.
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4. Lesson Schedule

Our Curriculum is specially designed and organized to lead your child from toddlerhood to full readiness for reading. Go through all the activities in order, making sure your child has a good handle on each one before you move on to the next. Print out our Phonological/Phonemic Awareness Pacing Guide for suggestions on how to focus your lessons for children of different ages. When your child reaches the end of our program, he/she will know all the letter sounds and will be well on his/her way to learning to read! ↑ Top

5. Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How old does my child need to be before I start teaching him Phonological/Phonemic Awareness? A: The Phonological/Phonemic Awareness curriculum is generally recommended for children who are three through five years old. Some of the Listening activities can be done with a child as young as two, but only if the child is a willing participant. Q: How long will it take to go through the entire Phonological/Phonemic Awareness curriculum? A: Again, this depends on your particular child or group of children. The average time for typical four- and five-year-old children is ten months or one school year. Q: All the pages have scripts for how to do each activity. Do I really need to follow the script exactly? A: We have worked hard to develop scripts that will make each activity go as smoothly as possible. Our scripts use age-appropriate vocabulary and terminology. We strongly recommend that you not add much to the script, particularly extra words that “clutter up” the activity and confuse or distract the child from the task at hand. ↑ Top

30 Responses to “Phonological/Phonemic Awareness Curriculum”

  1. Cleo

    Wow, I am sooooo blown away by the sheer amount of activities, variety, depth and complexity that went into creating the sequence for this curriculum. The fact that you choose to share these amazing resources FREE OF CHARGE is also mind blowing. I am a seasoned veteran with 13+ years instructing ESL Early childhood students and I have never encountered a curriculum like yours. You ensured that all areas of literacy development were covered in a fun hands-on multi-sensory progression of skills. This is my new small group phonics go-to resource this year!

    I am so excited to have stumbled across this resource!! ♡♡♡♡ I am going to spread the news through my social networks and on my campus.☆☆☆ This curriculum is not only great for educators in a formal setting, but also home schoolers, tutors, parent volunteers, and parents who are looking for a comprehensive and easy to implement resource. You have ensured that quality instruction is accessible for all students by creating and sharing this resource. THIS IS A 5 STAR PRODUCT ☆☆☆☆☆.

    I can’t wait to print and compile them in a binder and literacy bags. After the students master the skill, they will independently use them in literacy workstations independently and cooperatively in groups as well. Thank you for the treasure trove of blessings once again.

    Cleo Jones
    Briargrove Elementary

    Reply
  2. GL

    Wow! I’m an SDC teacher, and I can’t wait to start using these in my classroom. They seem like perfect activities to help my kids to start thinking about sounds and sentences. Thank you SO much for the free resource; feel like I’ve hit the jackpot today. 😀

    ADMIN – Hi GL,

    So happy to hear that the lessons and materials were useful. Stay in touch.

    Reply
  3. Fouzina

    A wonderful site with so many materials. Thanks a lot

    Reply
  4. Patricia

    I love your site! It’s fantastic and has so many useful resources!
    Thank you!

    Reply
  5. Chantal

    Oh, thank you so much for sharing this, especially for free! I have been searching for a good pre-school curriculum to help my 3 yo. get ready for reading. I am so excited to start this tomorrow with him. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

    Reply
  6. Lori Armon

    I love this website. I am a pre-k teacher, but am also almost done with my masters in reading, and I am in the process of using some of these things in my classroom and in my tutoring sessions that I do for my master classes. I will certainly share this website with my pre-k friends and my reading classmates.

    Reply
  7. Jenny P.

    I’m a homeschooler that just stumbled on this site. Don’t know how long you’ve been around but this is a god-send!!!

    I love how organized and simple the instructions are for each activity, and of course that it’s all free! The editable materials especially.

    I mean I don’t know what else to say! I’m speechless! THANK YOU!

    Reply
  8. Crystal M.

    I love your site! It has so many fantastic activities, games, and wonderful word list. I will definitely use this site in the fall with my first grade classroom. Thank you so very, very much.

    Reply
  9. Hazel

    Your site is awesome!!! I have spent hours just going through all the resources you have shared…and just can’t wait to share it with my teachers. Love the technique of teaching Sight Words. THANK YOU.

    Reply
  10. Rosa

    You site appears to have all we need to introduce our students to sound, words and reading; best of all it’s free.

    Reply
  11. PRECIOUS S MARUAPULA

    Your site is marvelous. it has so many interesting activities which are very good for children. I’m doing my Masters in reading. I am looking at the abilities of grade one children who have been to preschool. Thanks for helping me to finish my Masters.

    Reply
  12. Trae

    This is the best curriculum I have found, even better than the ones we have bought. So clear.

    Reply
  13. Pam

    All of this material is so clear and extremely user-friendly. I work with early primary students with specific learning disabilities. Thank you for this wonderful website.

    Reply
  14. hayley

    THANK YOU soooo much for this incredible resource. I have started at an NGO ( non -profit) school we had no Resources and now thanks to this wonderful site we have a whole lot of resources. Thank you for sharing this . The fact that this site is free is amazing.

    Reply
  15. Soraya Quezada

    Aww! I am a beginner English teacher teaching it as a second language. At first I was driven extremely crazy, trying to successfully plan a lesson. I worked in ESL for two years in a private school, but at the end of my second year I was give the sack because I couldn’t succeed in lesson planning. These ideas and games were exactly what I needed, so I can spend my time on teaching instead of lesson planning. Thanks a million!

    Reply
  16. Carolyn Pearlingi

    This site has been very useful for my classroom. Thanks

    Reply
  17. Joy Nelson

    As a special education teacher in grades 3-5, I have to say, this site is the best I have found yet to reinforce learning and cover gaps my students have when it comes to reading. I can’t tell you how excited I am to have found your material! I will be using this the rest of my teaching career.

    Reply
  18. Cv

    Thank you for these excellent resources. Both thourogh and fun.! I have three sons with moderate to severe Dyslexia and your activities are excellent teaching / rienforcement tools.

    Reply
  19. Mohammed Azher

    Great work! I love this site, its awesome. My kids are struggling to read and I have been searching for perfect material to help them and my search ends here.

    I don’t know how to thank you guys for this amazing & mind blowing work, its really Godsend to me. I am speechless! THANK YOU VERY MUCH!

    Reply
  20. Jennifer Ganus

    I am very curious as to where I should start my ten yr old likely dyslexic struggling son. At the beginning?

    ADMIN – Hi Jennifer,

    Start by taking the phonemic awareness assessment, see where you currently stand, and take it from there. If in doubt, I always go back a little – if it is easy for him then you will breaze through. You don’t every want to be missing foundation material – as it makes everything much harder later on.

    Reply
  21. Divya

    Hi.
    I happen to come across your website as suggested by a friend. I am really amazed to see the content and how user friendly it is.
    I wanted to start reading with my son who is diagnosed with Autism and is 8 yrs old.
    He is non verbal and uses gestures and verbal proximations to communicate his needs.
    Is it possible to teach a child who is non verbal with the same methodology. His receptive skills are improving and now I think I should start reading with him.
    Please suggest.

    ADMIN – Hi Divya,

    From what you suggest, it seems like you might be better off focusing on improving verbal skills. His verbal skills will be much more important than he reading in terms of quality of life.

    You can use the same methods with children with learning disabilities. We come from a special ed background, and we used these tools with our own children.

    Wishing you all the best. It is a difficult road, and we appreciate the extra effort you are putting in to help him.

    Reply
    • Ettina

      I disagree with the advice to focus on verbal skills. Autistic people (and people with other disabilities that affect speech) often have an easier time with written communication than verbal communication, and teaching a nonverbal individual to read can open up a lot of opportunities for them to use text to compensate for speech impairment. However, the curriculum presented here is not really suitable for a nonverbal child. Instead, I would suggest looking at PrAACtical AAC’s posts on reading instruction for AAC users:

      https://praacticalaac.org/tag/reading/

      Reply
  22. angelicalucy

    I am blown away by all the resources you have provided and how it is organized. Each lesson builds upon the other. These are foundational pieces to prepare children for reading and reading successfully. I am the RtI Interventionist on my campus, and this is going to help me tremendously to target skills that children are struggling with along with supporting teachers with activities they can do to target their interventions.

    Thank you so much! I was not expecting to find something as wonderful as this!

    Reply
  23. Donna Perry

    What an amazing site! These resources are incredible. Thank you for your creativity, hard word, and generosity.

    Reply
  24. Sheila Sturzel

    ‘re First things first game – is it possible to add some words/pictures starting with short vowels? E.g. ant apple egg igloo octopus umbrella or is it possible to edit the file to add my own pictures? Great resource. Many thanks

    Reply
  25. Stacey

    Ok I keep reading the FAQ and comments and can’t seem to find the answer. Do I need to be teaching phonemes alongside these activities? The introduction states that this gets a child ready for reading, however before the B section it suggests knowledge of the phonemes. But I don’t see that integrated so I’m curious what the best practice would be?

    PS this was great for filling in gaps when I was teaching my 5yo to read. My 3.5 year old however has zero interest in learning anything thus far so I’m hoping this helps!

    Reply
  26. Phyllis Wade

    I need a quote 3 teachers would like to purchase this program

    Reply
    • Sight Words Admin

      Thanks for your message, Phyllis. All our resources here are free for downloading and printing. Please share our link(s) with those teachers. Cheers.

      Reply
  27. Kim Adams

    I am sooo thankful that I found this website!!! It has so many useful activities!! I love how you have included all components of the lesson that are needed to teach. Thank you so much!!!

    Reply

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