Improving the Ability of Grade III Pupils to Identify Letters and Sounds through “Kaibigan Ko Si Titik” Program

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

San Agustin Central Elementary School with a total population of five hundred thirteen (513) students encountered issues of difficulty in identifying letters and sounds resulting in absenteeism, students' misbehavior, low performance in the class and the like. At the start of the school year, the teachers assessed students in recognizing letters and sounds through the Initial Letters and Sounds Identification Assessment Score Index. Out of thirty-six (36) students in Grade III, there were (6) identified students who had difficulty in identifying letters and sounds. The researchers employed the "Kaibigan Ko Si Titik Program" to address the pupils difficulty in identifying letters and sounds. If this problem will not be given attention, the pupils will be retained or will pass but still suffers difficulty in reading.

METHODS

"Kaibigan ko si Titik" Program was an intervention conducted to cater to the problem in identifying letters and sounds of students that aimed to make students become successful readers. A 3-month intervention through the "Kaibigan Ko si Titik" Program was given to 6 Grade III students who cannot identify initial letters and sounds that greatly affect their performance rating. This intervention was purposely given for them to identify correctly initial letters and sounds from October 2017 - December 2017. Their attendance was checked and monitored regularly in every session. Their performance rating for the last quarter will be used as the basis for the analyses of results.

RESULTS

The result shows that the ability of Grade III students in identifying letters and sounds was improved after the implementation of the "Kaibigan ko si Titik" Program. This simply indicates that the said intervention was very effective. Hence, the researcher encourages other teachers to employ said intervention to improve students reading skills.

DISCUSSIONS

The research respondents of the study were the 6 Grade III students of San Agustin Central Elementary School, School Year 2017-2018 who had problems identifying letters initial letters and sounds. The Meta-Comprehension Strategy Index (MSI) was used in gathering data and had three strategies on identifying letters and sound acquisition. Part 1 of the MSI consists of a statement about the strategies before the identification of letters and sounds. Likewise, part 2 of the MSI consists of the improvements of the letters and sounds after using worksheet phonic strategy, domino phonic strategy, and phoneme phonic strategy.