During the emergent literacy phase, children are busy developing their oral language, their understandings of how and why to use print, and their early phonemic and syntactic awareness (Senechal, LeFerve, Smith-Chant, & Colton, 2001).

An important component of beginning reading instruction is effectively teaching letters and sounds. Related to letter and sound knowledge are phonological awareness (the ability to hear and manipulate sounds in oral language(, and phonemic awareness (the ability to hear and manipulate phonemes, the smallest units of sound in oral language). It can be tempting to teach these skills in isolation since they can be easily parsed, but they are very difficult to apply and generalize when they are taught in isolation. (from Quick Guides to Inclusion, page 185)

Alphabet knowledge is the knowledge of individual letter names, sounds, and shapes. The alphabetic principle is the idea that letters and groups of letters represent the sounds of spoken language. Readers apply the alphabetic principle through phonics when they use their knowledge of the relationships between sounds and letters to read both familiar and unfamiliar words.

The goal of instruction in the alphabetic principle is to teach students to apply their knowledge of letters and letter sounds rather than targeting identification, matching, and mastery through direct instruction and repeated trials. There is no evidence to support that isolated instruction of alphabet knowledge has any impact on important reading-related outcomes. (from Research Based Practices for Creating Access to the General Curriculum in Reading and Literacy for Students with Significant Intellectual Disabilities)

• know some of the letters of the alphabet, some of the time
• do not yet know the letters of the alphabet
• are beginning to develop letter-sound connections
• have not yet developed letter-sound connections
• are developing print awareness and are scribbling

Students who are at the emergent reading and writing level need explicit instruction around the alphabet and sounds to improve their alphabet knowledge and phonological awareness.

Hall and Williams (2000) list “letters and sounds” as one of the primary blocks that needs to be focused on in emergent literacy instruction. Letters and sounds are often listed together because as well as learning the letters, students also need to develop the alphabetic principle.  They need to understand the different sounds that individual letters and groups of letters can make – and use this alphabetic principle to begin to spell words and to decode words. (from Jane Farrall)

Practice in manipulating sounds in words is a necessary preliminary ability to the systematic study of phonics, which takes the next step to connect these sounds to letters and words in print (word identification and decoding).