ABSTRACT
Alphabetics refers to the system of representing words and phonemes with letters and includes phonemic awareness, grapheme-phoneme correspondences, and spelling patterns. It also refers to the use of alphabetic knowledge to spell words and to read words by sight, by decoding, by analogy, and by prediction. Phonemic awareness (PA) instruction teaches students how to manipulate phonemes in spoken words, with letters sometimes used to support instruction. Systematic phonics instruction teaches the major grapheme-phoneme correspondences and their use to decode and spell words.
Findings of two meta-analyses revealed that both PA instruction and systematic phonics instruction helped children learn to read and spell more effectively than alternative forms of instruction. Both were especially effective for beginners at risk of reading failure. Phonics instruction exerted a greater impact in the early grades (kindergarten and first) when it was the method used to start children out than in the later grades (second through sixth) after children had made some progress in reading, presumably with another method. Findings support Chall (1967) in underscoring the importance of teaching alphabetics early, especially in schools with large numbers of at-risk students who enter school with very little letter knowledge or phonemic awareness.
