Can phonemic awareness be trained in kindergarten?

Abstract

The effect of a training program designed to develop phonemic awareness skills in kindergarten was assessed in a study involving three experimental groups and two control groups. The degree of structure imposed upon the program was varied in the experimental groups. One control group was trained in non‐verbal auditory discrimination, and the second control group followed the ordinary preschool program during the 6–8 week observational period. A clear improvement in the ability to segment and blend three‐phoneme words was observed in the highly structured training cohdition, especially among the children with poor pre‐test performance, while no clear changes from pre‐ to post‐test were found in the other groups. It was concluded that phonemic awareness can be developed in prereaders outside the context of formal reading instruction.