Improving phonological awareness through children's stories in a Turkish school

The present study was carried out to examine the changes in phonological awareness skills among Turkish-speaking 1st and 2nd grade EFL learners following a children's literature-based intervention program. The study adopted a pre-posttest quasi experimental study design to examine the efficacy of the phonological awareness instruction. A total of 145 Turkish 1st and 2nd grade English language learners at a private school participated in the study. The phonological awareness skills of the learners were evaluated through phonological awareness and skills test based on 14 different aspects of phonological awareness before and after the intervention program. Students received phonological awareness instruction twice a week for 40 minutes lessons for two months based on a phonological awareness curriculum. The study results showed that both 1st and 2nd grade EFL learners improved their EFL phonological awareness skills following the intervention. It was also found that 1stgraders showed more progress than the 2ndgraders. Finally, students across grade levels the highest achievement was in rhyme production. The results granted promising instructional implications for future uses for the phonics-based story books to improve English phonological awareness of young language learners.