1. Knowledge of the alphabetic code
Phonics includes
Skills of blending and segmenting
Knowledge of the alphabetic code +

2. Phonemes and Graphemes
Phoneme- The smallest unit of sound in a word.
Can be represented by one or more letters eg th, ear
Grapheme – The letter or letters representing the phoneme. Eg s, th
Digraph – Two letters representing one phoneme. Eg sh, ch, th, ss
Some of the vocab that your children might come home using, we try to introduce it early on so that the children are very used to hearing it.
Trigraph – Three letters representing one phoneme. Eg air, ear, igh
The same phoneme can be represented in more than one way. Eg ee, ea,

3. (For English Language)
Phonics System
(For English Language)
26 letters of the alphabet
44 phonemes
140 ways of representing them
This just shows how much there is to learn in phoincs and how complicated it is.

4. Correct Enunciation of Phonemes
Continuing sounds- f, m, n, r, s, sh, v, th, z
Without voice/ from your throat- c, p, t, ch, h
As clearly as possible – b, d, g, w, qu, y
Important to say sounds correctly as this helps with blending and segmenting.

5. Blending and Segmenting
Recognising the letter sounds in a word eg c-a-t and merging them together, in the order in which they occur in the word, to read the word ‘cat’
Segmenting
Identifying the individual sounds in a spoken word eg d-o-g and writing down the letters for each sound (phoneme) to make the word ‘dog’
Very important skills for reading and writing, we start to teach this as soon as they know a few sounds. In phase 2 s,a,t,p first then we can start words like tap, pat, sat.
Children can find this hard sometimes they can segment but not blend and the other way around. It takes a lot of practise. Giving them a choice of word initially can help.

6. Phonics is a key skill in both reading and writing
Phonics is a key skill in both reading and writing. It is the first step to fluent word recognition. Phonics teaching can begin in the nursery ( show you in a second).
We start teaching phonics lessons within the first few weeks of them starting school.
There are different schemes to follow when teaching phonics, The one we use is called Letters and Sounds. If you type this into google you can get onto the website and see how it is divided up. Go through book.
Phonics is taught as a separate lesson for 20mins each day in EYFS and KS1. Children are streamed for more targeted teaching, groups are very fluid and children can be moved at any time during the year.
Phonics test in Year 1.