Explicit Phonemic Awareness
A structured literacy program provides explicit and systematic teaching through a comprehensive curriculum with a sequential set of phonics elements in a multisensory approach (Al Otaiba et al., 2009; Eissa, 2014; Ghoneim & Elghotmy, 2015; Goldstein et al., 2017; Lim & Oei, 2015; Vaden-Kiernan et al., 2016; Wise et al., 2015) because students develop their PA through their development of phonemic awareness. Biemiller (1978) found that reading differences emerged as early as the middle of first grade. Carson et al (2008) determined the importance of explicit phonemic awareness instruction for struggling readers in their study of 251 British schoolchildren; the percent of students being identified as having a reading disorder was reduced from