Tools for Building Phonological Awareness: #3 Minimal Pairs

Ultimate Literacy Phonological Phonemic Awareness Tool #3: Minimal Pairs

An Affordable Alternative to Bjorem Speech Sound Cues

From over 33 years of experience as a speech-language pathologist, this resource brings together the best strategies, tools, tips and tricks that I have to support children with speech sounds.

Contents:

• 456 Minimal Pairs Covering all Vowels and Major Consonant Combinations
• Suggestions for Games and Activities
• Ultimate Sound Cues to add meaning and boost learning
• Teaching Principles

Benefits:

Phonemic Awareness, also called Phonological Awareness, is a crucial foundational skill for early reading and spelling skills. Children need to be able to recognize and manipulate sounds to be successful at early literacy. Parents, teachers and therapists can help children learn these skills and impact a child’s reading, writing, and overall academic success.

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, ASHA, recognizes the importance of phonemic skills for both speech sound development and early literacy. Speech Therapists are able to work on phonemic awareness in unique ways.

Seven Essential Skills for Phonemic Awareness:

• Recognize and Produce Rhymes
• Blend Sounds Together
• Break Words Apart into Syllables and Sounds
• Deletion – Take Syllables/Sounds Out of Words
• Recognize Sounds in Different Positions of Words
• Manipulate Sounds in Words to Change One Word to Another
• Sound Letter Correspondence – Knowing what Sounds Letters Make

The Ultimate Literacy program provides 3 sets of tools: Rhyming Sets / Word Families, Puzzle Words and Minimal Pairs. These are fun and effective materials for working on all of the essential skills. Each tool is provided in a separate volume. This Tool is Minimal Pairs.

To add more meaning, each sound in every practice word is paired with my Ultimate Speech Sound Cues. This pairs a Picture Symbol, a Label and a Hand Gesture for each sound in English.

Sound Cues provide extra information that helps children understand what sound each letter makes, what sounds make up words and how to manipulate sounds in words. English is confusing, sound cues help.

The Picture Symbols and the sounds they represent are included with each set of tools. The full Speech Sound Cues Program, including the hand gestures for each sound and more information can be downloaded for free on this website at: Ultimate Sound Cues

Tool #3 Minimal Pairs

Minimal Pairs are words that differ only by one sound such as Cat/Hat, One/Run and Tar/Star. Minimal Pairs are very powerful. Children learn that changing just one sound in a word can change it to something else.

Minimal Pairs can be used to work on these phonological awareness skills:

• Recognize and Produce Rhymes
• Recognize Sounds in Different Positions of Words
• Manipulate Sounds in Words to Change One Word to Another
• Sound Letter Correspondence – Knowing what Sounds Letters Make

This program has 456 minimal pairs covering a wide variety of consonants and vowel differences.

These are the same ideas and materials that I use to support the children and parents that I see in my practice. I hope you find them helpful.
This program contains the same tools and ideas that I use to support the children and parents that I see in my practice. I hope you find them helpful.

Please let me know I you have any questions.

Garth Schindel SLPatHome
SLP@Speech-TherapyAtHome.com