I Hear the Sound: Decode to Read™ Level 1 — A Phonemic Awareness Reader

Before a child can read a word, they have to hear one. I Hear the Sound is a read-aloud built on the sounds a child already knows - rain on the window, a bee in the garden, the clock on the wall, the drum they cannot stop banging. Each page pairs one sound with one picture and three short rhyming lines, so a young listener can find the rhythm, catch the rhyme, and say it back. Phonemic awareness - the ability to hear and play with the individual sounds inside spoken words - is the strongest early predictor of reading success. It comes before letters. It comes before decoding. It starts with listening. This is Level 1 of the Decode to Read(TM) Series: a step-by-step path from listening, to letters, to reading with confidence. Inside: - Twelve sound pages, each with a full-page illustration - Rhyming three-line text written for reading aloud - A closing night page on stillness - because silence is a sound too - A "What sounds do YOU hear?" drawing page - A Parent & Teacher guide with five activities: rhyme practice, syllable clapping, first-sound and last-sound isolation, phoneme substitution, and a listening walk Ages 3-6 - Preschool to Kindergarten - Read-aloud