The Literacy Garden

Do phoneme awareness, phonological awareness, and phonics mean the same thing? Can the terms phonemic awareness vs phonological awareness be used interchangeably? Let’s demystify these terms!  Although each word starts with phon, they do not mean the same thing.  The Greek root phon means sound. So phonemic awareness, phonological awareness and phonics are related terms, but not identical. What is Phonological Awareness?  Phonological Awareness is a broad term that involves orally identifying and manipulating sounds. This…

Do you get blank stares when you teach what character traits are? Are their answers limited to words such as “nice” or “mean”?  When I taught second grade, I quickly realized how limited my students’ vocabulary was when it came to describing the character traits of a person. They could easily tell me what the character looked like on the outside, but on the inside? Not so much. The good news is I will explain 5 activities…