Phonics ph o i s n c 1

What is Phonics? Phonics is a way of teaching children to read quickly and skilfully. They are taught how to: recognise the sounds that each individual letter makes; identify the sounds that different combinations of letters make - such as ‘sh’ or ‘oo’; and blend these sounds together from left to right to make a word. Children can then use this knowledge to ‘de-code’ new words that they hear or see. This is the first important step in learning to read.

Why Phonics? Research shows that when phonics is taught in a structured way - starting with the easiest sounds and progressing through to the most complex – it is the most effective way of teaching young children to read. It is particularly helpful for children aged 4–7. Almost all children who receive good teaching of phonics will learn the skills they need to tackle new words. They can then go on to read any kind of text fluently and confidently, and to read for enjoyment. Children who have been taught phonics also tend to read more accurately than those taught using other methods, such as ‘look and say’. This includes children who find learning to read difficult, for example those who have dyslexia. Rose report

Alphabetic Code 44 phonemes represented by 26 letters Alphabet has 21 consonants (spoken 24) and 5 vowels (spoken 20) 85% of English spelling is predictable A grapheme is a letter or a number of letters that represent a sound (phoneme) in a word. Another way to explain it is to say that a grapheme is a letter or letters that spell a sound in a word.

Enunciation Teaching phonics requires a technical skill in enunciation Phonemes should be articulated clearly and precisely Easier to blend

How to pronounce the sounds.

Digraph Two letters, which make one phoneme. A consonant digraph contains 2 consonants: sh ck th ll A vowel digraph contains at least one vowel: ai ay ar oa ow oy

Split digraph A vowel digraph in which the two letters are not adjacent – e.g. ‘make’.

Trigraph A trigraph is a phoneme which consists of three letters. E.g. chr, which makes the /chr/ sound as in chrome and chromosome dge, which makes the /g/ sound as in dodge and partridge tch, which makes the /tch/ sound as in catch, match

Blending Recognising the phonemes in a written word, for example c-u-p, sh-ee-p, and merging or synthesising them in the order in which they are written to pronounce the word: ‘cup’, ‘sheep’.

Segmenting Identifying the individual sounds in a spoken word (e.g. h-i-m, s-t-or-k) and writing down letters for each sound (phoneme) to form the word ‘him’.

Segmenting bridge boy king train sprout bleed PHONEMES WORD 12

down day thorn car boy church chick Fingers for spelling

CVC words These words each have three phonemes (separate sounds) CVC words These words each have three phonemes (separate sounds). Each of these phonemes is represented by a grapheme. 1 2 3 c a t b ir d f i sh kn igh

Words sometimes wrongly identified as CVC bow few saw her 15

Step One Central importance of developing speaking and listening skills General sound awareness Ability to discriminate individual phonemes Introduces oral blending and segmenting, paving the way for systematic phonics teaching Promotes range and depth of language experience Continues beyond introduction of Phase 2 16

Step Two s a t Starts to introduce letters and associated sounds Decoding and encoding taught as reversible processes As soon as children know a few phonemes, blending and segmenting can start ( /s/a/t/p/i/n/) ‘Tricky’ words e.g.; the, to, I, go, no s a t 17

Step Three was are Introduces graphemes for most other phonemes, most comprising two letters One representation of each of 44 phonemes (except ‘zh’ in ‘vision’ Phase 5) Reading and spelling one and two syllable words and captions Tricky words: he, she, we, me, be, was, my, you, they, her, all, are, Teach letter names – sing alphabet songs Typical duration: Up to 12 weeks are 18

Year 1 phonics check It is a short, simple screening check to make sure that all pupils have grasped fundamental phonic skills. It comprises a list of 40 words (real words) and non-words (pseudo words), which a child will read one-to-one with a teacher. The check is very similar to tasks the children already complete during phonics lessons. Children will be asked to ‘sound out’ a word and blend the sounds together.eg d-o-g - dog The focus of the check is to see which sounds the children know and therefore the children will be asked to read made up ‘nonsense’ words. THIS IS NOT A READING TEST

Examples of words:

Jolly Phonics

What are we doing in school? 20 mins daily discrete phonics lessons Taught according to phase in small groups Children are taught to read by breaking down words into separate sounds or ‘phonemes’. They are then taught how to blend these sounds together to read the whole word; There are around 40 different sounds. Shared Reading As part of each lesson Story time each day Independent Reading Adults listen to children read in Reception 3x a week and Year 1 2-3 times a week

What are we doing in school? Writing Shared writing Independent writing Interventions Small group targeted support for those who need revision where needed

How can you help? Encourage them to use their sounds and actions to find the sound they need. Children can practise their phonics by playing games online. The children particularly like - * Buried Treasure * Poopdeck Pirates * Picnic on Pluto