Phonological awareness involves thinking about the sounds in words rather than the meaning of a word. It is a crucial step in learning to read for young children. Infants are working very hard on developing these skills to prepare them for learning the sounds and learning to read later on in the school year.
Today we did some animal noises.
The children had to make each animal sound. This introduces the concept of symbols (e.g. letters) having a sound that is different than the name. By doing a line of sounds they are also working on left-right reading orientation and the concept of blending sounds together.
After a lot of practice, the children drew their own sound boards. Have a look:
