What phonemic awareness skill is demonstrated when a teacher asks students to identify the initial sound in the word "coin"?

The skill demonstrated when a teacher asks students to identify the initial sound in the word "coin" is phoneme recognition. Phoneme recognition involves the ability to hear and identify individual sounds in spoken words. By focusing on the initial sound, students are practicing a key aspect of phonemic awareness that helps them understand how words are constructed from sounds. This skill is essential for later reading development, as it builds a foundation for decoding words and improving reading fluency. In this case, recognizing that the initial sound in "coin" is /k/ is a clear example of phoneme recognition in action.