Phonological awareness is a skill related to the tasks of recognizing, separating, manipulating the sounds that make up the word, and noticing words consisting of common sounds. Phonological awareness skills develop in a similar and predictable way in every language. Children first become aware of large sound units and over time become sensitive to smaller sound units; In other words, there is a development of awareness from words to syllables and from syllables to sounds. Likewise, children learn to distinguish similar and different sounds before learning to manipulate sounds.
The difficulty levels of phonological awareness tasks differ from each other. It is easy to understand whether two words rhyme, but it is more difficult to find another that rhymes with a given word. Similarly, the task of finding out which word is different from the others is more difficult than finding out which two words start with the same sound.
Phonological awareness skills play a role as a determinant of reading difficulties. Research shows that phonological awareness skills in the preschool period are the predictors that have the greatest impact on learning reading and writing in school and being successful in academic life.
However, at the same time, teaching literacy is also effective in the development of phonological awareness skills. While some of the phonological awareness skills are skills that make reading and writing easier, some of them are skills acquired after reading and writing skills. In other words, reading-writing skills and phonological awareness skills are situations that affect each other bilaterally.
Considering these effects of phonological awareness skills and levels supported by research; It can be said that determining the phonological awareness levels of individuals and intervening in the clinical environment to individuals in need will significantly affect both their academic and psycho-social lives.
There is no standard test applied in our country to determine the phonological awareness levels of individuals, both in the clinical environment and in the clinical environment. This also causes a significant deficiency in research in the field. The aim of this pilot study was to measure individuals' phonological awareness skills. To take the first step to develop a standard test that will provide the These subtests:
Word level
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Word counting
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Word throwing
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Word fusion
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Word separation
Rhyme level
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Rhyme discrimination
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Rhyme production
Syllable level
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Syllable counting
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Syllable fusion
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Syllable division
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Syllabic deletion
Phone level
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Phone discrimination
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Finding the beginning phoneme
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Finding the last phoneme
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Phoneme fusion
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Phoneme splitting
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Phoneme deletion
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Phoneme addition
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Phoneme substitution
Pilot study ages 5 It was conducted with a total of 40 participants (20 girls-20 boys) ranging from -7. Participants who did not have any previously identified neurological, psychological or structural problems were randomly selected by classroom and kindergarten teachers on a voluntary basis and were included in the study. Cases with language and speech disorders or who had previously received therapy for the language and speech field were not included in the study. Data for the pilot study were collected from Köyceğiz district of Muğla province.
Findings:
According to the results obtained from the analysis on phonological awareness skills at the word level;
When age groups are compared in the areas of word counting, omission, blending and separation, it has been observed that these skills develop in direct proportion to age. The 7-year-old group showed a better performance than other age groups in every field. Participants in the 5-year-old group had the lowest performance in the field of word throwing; They show the best performance in the word fusion skill. Participants in the 6-year-old group mentioned the lowest performance by a very small margin. They show better word throwing and word counting skills, as well as being better in the field of small counting. It is also observed that this age group performs significantly better than other skills, especially in the field of word fusion. This also applies to participants in the 5-year-old group. Participants in the 7-year-old group showed the same performance in word blending and separation skills. While the participants in the 7-year-old group showed the lowest performance in the word counting skill, the participants in the 5-year-old and 6-year-old groups showed the lowest performance in the word throwing skill.
According to the results obtained from the analysis on phonological awareness skills at the syllable level:
The 7-year-old group showed similar performance in phonological awareness skills at the syllable level (syllable counting, syllable deletion, syllable fusion and syllable division). While the highest performance was demonstrated at the same level in syllable fusion and segmentation skills; This age group showed the lowest performance in the syllable counting skill. While this is also valid for participants in the 6-year-old group, participants in the 5-year-old group showed the lowest performance in the syllable deletion skill. While the skill in which the 5-year-old group performs best is the syllable segmentation skill with a small difference, the skill in which the 6-year-old group performs the best is the syllable fusion skill. When we look at the phonological awareness skills at the syllable level, another of the results obtained is that the phonological awareness skills in this area develop in direct proportion to age, just like the phonological awareness skills at the word level.
According to the results obtained as a result of the analysis on the phonological awareness skills at the phoneme level;
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Phone discrimination
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Finding the beginning phoneme
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Finding the last phoneme
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Phoneme fusion
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Phoneme splitting
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Phoneme deletion
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Phoneme addition
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Phoneme substitution
In the fields of 7-year-old group The skill in which he showed the highest performance was the skill of finding the initial phoneme, with a small difference. This skill is followed by the ability to find the final phoneme. 7 years old group shows the lowest performance at the phoneme level in phoneme separation skill. While individuals in the 6-year-old group show similar performance in phonological awareness skills at the phoneme level, the highest performance is in finding the initial phoneme; They showed the lowest performance in the phoneme substitution skill. Individuals in the 5-year-old group show the highest performance in the skill of finding the initial phoneme at a significant level, while they show the lowest performance in the phoneme substitution skill, as in the 6-year-old group. One of the striking results is that, compared to phonological awareness skills at the syllable and word level, phonological awareness skills at the phoneme level increase at a higher rate with age. Especially individuals in the 5-year-old group show a significantly lower performance than other age groups in phonological awareness skills at the phoneme level.
According to the results obtained from the analysis on phonological awareness skills at the rhyme level;
Individuals in the 7-year-old group showed a higher performance in rhyme discrimination skill than in rhyme production skill. This situation was also observed in the performances of individuals in the 6 and 5 age groups. While individuals in the 6 and 5-year-old groups performed the same in rhyme production skill, individuals in the 6-year-old group showed a significantly higher performance than individuals in the 5-year-old group in rhyme production skill. When we look at the results in general, it is observed that phonological awareness skills at the rhyme level develop in direct proportion to age, just like other skills.
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