fun with phonemes

Last week we had our first literacy class in the elementary school we'll be working at for the rest of the quarter. My cohortmate, Amelia, and I met our kindergarten reading buddy, Nathan*. What a fantastic little boy Nathan is! I was quite astounded by Nathan. We had great fun filling out our "getting to know one another" questionnaire. Once we got started on it, Nathan insisted on writing down everyone's answers all by himself. I was quite impressed with his thoughtful concentration and ability to spell out words phonetically. I didn't realize until yesterday, when I read Fox's chapters on phonemic and phonological awareness in her book Word Identification Strategies, that we were being wise when we let him try to spell out words phonetically. Apparently, this exercise built up his phonemic awareness as he tried to identify the sounds he heard in the words and write them down. This seems a particular skill of Nathan's, as he came very close to correctly spelling a lot of the words he was recording for us.

His ability to identify sounds in words became even more apparent when it was time for us to read him our book selections. Nathan turned the tables and insisted on reading to us! My book selection, The Very Busy Spider, had some words in it that were pretty sophisticated for a kindergartner, and so did Amelia's. However, I can't recall more than a few words that Nathan couldn't manage to sound out correctly on his own. He also recognized word patterns in the book, such as phrases that regularly repeated and he surprised me when, a few pages into his reading, he announced the connection between The Very Busy Spider and another book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar - both were written by the same author. I was quite impressed with Nathan. As precocious as he is, he will need to allow us to read to him in the future, in order to practice his comprehension skills. Although he could sound out words, he didn't always understand them and he wasn't really reflective in his reading because he was too focused on sounding out the words correctly. I am not sure how well he could have summarized or re-told the stories he read to us.

In all, I think it's going to be an absolute pleasure working with Nathan (and with Amelia, too!). It's clear his kindergarten teacher has done an excellent job promoting literacy in her classroom. Literacy was highlighted in many ways that spoke to its importance, such as the alphabet charts on desks and on the walls, a lite brite for spelling out words, and signs and sight words posted throughout the room. I'm excited for next week.

*name changed to protect privacy