The Most Important Thing to Teach a Young Language Learner

I claim that phonemic awareness (PA) is the most important thing you can teach a young foreign language learner and make the claim based on two facts. One is that PA is simply that fundamental. The other is that it gets more difficult with time. It is critical to listening, speaking and reading (phonics).  For native speakers, PA has been shown to be the most important predictor of literacy acquisition. For non-native language learners it is that important for reading, but is equally important for listening and speaking. And, it gets more difficult with time. It is the one skill that gets more difficult. It needs to be taught as young as possible.

To repeat, the ability to hear the sounds is critical for listening, speaking and reading (phonics). In this course I will discuss the method proven to be the most effective way to teach the sounds. There will be some theory for those who are interested, but there will also be a lot of practice. Students will learn and learn to teach. The method discussed is High Variability Phonemic Training (HVPT). Also, the videos are downloadable so teachers will be able to use them in their classrooms.

It is vitally important that young learners hear the sounds that are difficult for them. But, as explained in the course, we lose the ability to hear the sounds of a second language before we learn to speak our native language. Learners cannot hear, that is they cannot distinguish all the sounds. They can learn to do this but the sounds have to be made audible, They have to be contrasted and exaggerated. This is HVPT and this course offers a lot of training in HVPT.