Elaborations

• identifying the 29 letters of the Vietnamese alphabet by their names and sounds as well as the five tone markers
• building phonic awareness by recognising and experimenting with sounds and rhythms, focusing on letters that are similar in the English alphabet but produce different sounds in Vietnamese, for example, eand i, d and đ
• developing pronunciation, phrasing and intonation skills by singing, reciting and repeating words and phrases
• noticing that Vietnamese is a tonal language, and that pitch changes affect the meaning of words
• understanding that although Vietnamese and English use the same alphabet there are additional symbols/markers that create more letters in Vietnamese
• developing familiarity with similarities and differences in Vietnamese sound–letter correspondence, such as a, ă, â; e, ê; o, ô, ơ; u, ư; as well as c and k, i and y, s and x, and ch and tr
• noticing that the same word with different tone markers has different meanings, for example, ma, mà, má, mả, mã and mạ
• exploring Vietnamese spelling strategies such as grouping words according to initial letters that represent particular sounds, for example, h (hoa hồng, hát, học) orm (mẹ, má, mèo)
• using single and consonant clusters, vowels and vowel clusters with tone markers to form and spell words, for example, ta, la, tha, nga
• recognising and using lower and upper case letters