The Importance of Phonological Awareness

Phonological awareness is extremely important for children in regards to their expected reading ability (Honig et al. 2002). The English language is comprised of various organizational components including sentences and words. If a child understands the concepts of spoken sentences and words he or she will be more likely to understand the concepts in a written format. Without phonological awareness, a child cannot develop phonemic awareness. The recognition that there are individual sounds in oral language helps children decode and encode unknown words.

If a child does not have phonemic awareness skills, it is difficult for that child to comprehend phonics instruction. Phonemic awareness is the bridge to understanding principles taught in phonics lessons. Many children create this bridge naturally; other children need to be explicitly taught phonetic patterns (Snider 1995). If a child is asked to spell cat and he or she does not know that there are three separate phonemes in the word, he or she will not be able to phonetically spell the word. Without phonemic awareness a child must use visual memory to recognize and spell words. No patterns are learned or recognized, making reading a laborious task for children.