Teaching letter sound identification with audio visual aids

Abstract

The study examined the effectiveness of using audio-visual aids in teaching letter sound identification to KG 2 pupils at the Jema D/A Primary School and the Jema Islamic Primary School. A total number of 59 pupils and 4 teachers from the two selected schools participated in the study. Pre-intervention and post intervention tests were conducted to test the effectiveness of using audio-visual aids in teaching letter sound identification. The research looked at how to assess the letter sound identification ability of the pupils of the Jema D/A and Islamic primary schools, and to examine the effectiveness of using audio-visual aids to teach letter sound identification at the Jema D/A and Islamic primary schools and to explore the Jema D/A and Islamic primary school teachers’ experiences with using audio-visual aids to teach letter sound identification. Analysis of the intervention tests clearly indicates that the use of audio-visual aids in letter sound identification is highly effective. The pre-intervention test results of the pupils of both schools revealed that the pupils’ ability to identify letter sound was low. However, after using audio-visual aids, the performance of the pupils in identifying letter sounds significantly improved. At the Jema D/A Primary School, the use of audio-visual aids helped increase the highest score in the pre-intervention test from 76% to 100% and the lowest score from 20% to 64%. Similarly, at the Jema Islamic School, the use of audio-visual aids helped increase the highest score in the pre-intervention test from 76% to 96% and the lowest score from 20% to 64%. Therefore, it is highly recommended that to teach letter sound identification effectively, audio-visual aids should be used always. Audio-visual aids should be provided to the schools for the teaching of letter sound identification to help children to blend sounds and read. The teachers should be given training on the use of audio visual aids so that they can be confident about using them to teach and help the children to acquire and build their phonemic awareness and other early reading skills. Keywords: letter sound identification, audio-visual aids, phonemic awareness