Actually it's your in-dream memory that needs improving, not your awareness. Your problem isn't that you aren't noticing your dreams, it's remembering that what you're noticing is a dream. Meditation and reality checks focus more on awareness rather than memory. You need to focus on memory more. That's where I feel your off track with your thinking.

The best practice that I could think of to improve in-dream memory would be to reimagine a dream you recently had, only with you realizing that you were dreaming. Tell yourself that this is what should have happened and affirm that with this knowledge you'll likely become lucid during your next dream. That way, when a similar situation occurs while dreaming, you remember your intention and become lucid.

Personally, my lucid dreaming technique has revolved around listening to the environment around me while I'm falling asleep until I can see a dream scene with my closed eyelids. Sound until sight, I guess I'll call it. If I felt my memory needed a boost, I would do the memory exercise above and tell myself at the point I should have become lucid "When I can see, I'm dreaming". I might use this as a mantra as well if I was losing my focus while falling asleep.

Because is hard to stay conscious with SSILD for long periods of time sometimes needed to WILD, it's best to use it as a DILD/WILD hybrid. Why not go for both?