NES Elementary Education Subtest 1 2025 – 400 Free Practice Questions to Pass the Exam

Emergent readers are in the early stages of reading development and are typically preschoolers or kindergartners who are just beginning to understand the relationship between letters and sounds. This group focuses on foundational skills necessary for reading success. They engage in phonemic awareness activities that help them learn how individual sounds relate to letters, which is essential for reading and spelling.

At this stage, learners often practice letter recognition and the sounds associated with those letters through various methods, such as singing alphabet songs, using letter games, and sounding out simple words. This focus on letter-sound connections lays the groundwork for future reading proficiency, making it crucial for emergent readers to develop these skills early on.

In contrast, transitional, advanced, and intermediate readers have usually moved beyond these basic skills and are focusing on more complex reading strategies, comprehension, and fluency. This makes the emphasis on letter-sound connections a defining characteristic of emergent readers.