Phonemic Awareness: The Skills that They Need to Help Them Succeed! (Kindergarten Version)

Heggerty Phonemic Awareness Kindergarten lessons are meant to supplement existing literacy curriculum and are easily integrated into half-day or full-day kindergarten programs. When lessons are taught consistently each day with explicit teacher modeling and scaffolded support, teachers see improvement in students’ reading, spelling, and writing, as the students learn to hear the sounds in words. The kindergarten curriculum in English (blue book) spends more time on each skill. The kindergarten curriculum covers all consonants, short vowels, digraphs, blends, and rime patterns, with long vowel words being introduced in the later weeks of this curriculum. By comparison, the yellow book also goes further into long vowels and introduces R-controlled vowels, special vowel sounds, and multisyllabic words. The revised 2020 Edition of the English Kindergarten Curriculum includes increased complexity of words and tasks for multiple skills, a reorganization of the sequencing of skills within the 35 weeks, a reordering of lesson sequencing to allow for an easier transition into phonics instruction, and refined teacher modeling and support instructions.