Phonics at Katherine Semar Infant School Thursday 16th October 2014

Seven Areas of Learning in the Foundation Stage Personal, Social and Emotional Development Communication and Language Physical Development Mathematics Literacy Expressive Arts and Design Understanding the World

Linking sounds and letters Six phase teaching programme Phase 1 - Nursery/Reception Phase 2 - Reception Phase 3 - Reception Phase 4 - Reception Phase 5 - Year 1 Phase 6 - Year 2 Children progress through these stages at their own pace – some take longer to get there! This is a continual process from Foundation through Key Stage 1 and beyond.

Phase 1: Exploring sounds instrumental environmental rhyme and alliteration

Phase 1: Developing early reading and writing skills Before your child is ready to read – they must have lots of talking opportunities. If they can’t say it, they won’t be able to write it - poor language skills will make reading and writing very difficult.

Phase 1: Activities to support this phase Time for talk! In the car, in the bath, reading stories, at the dinner table - encourage your child to listen to others, share their opinion, describe what they can see. It is important that correct language is modelled and correct pronunciation of words – e.g, the not du or v. Time for rhyme Read and encourage your child to join in with nursery rhymes and poems. Play rhyming games – make up nonsense rhymes using your child’s name such as ‘Here comes Hattie, Pattie, Mattie’.

Phase 2: Exploring letters and corresponding sounds 19 phonemes are taught Blend phonemes and segment words Read ‘vc’ and ‘cvc’ words Tricky words

Phase 2: Terminology Phoneme - sounds of letter Grapheme - ‘shape’ of a letter Blend - putting sounds together to make a word for reading eg. c-a-t cat Segment - Pulling a word apart into it’s sounds for writing eg. cat c-a-t VC and CVC -VC is vowel consonant words - CVC is consonant vowel consonant words

Phase 3: Exploring letters 25 more phonemes are taught (most are letter combinations i.e two letters which make one sound – sh, th, ng) Read and spell ‘cvc’ words Letter names – alphabet song Spell tricky words

Phase 4: Consolidating knowledge 42 graphemes are known Consolidate reading and spelling of tricky words Consonant clusters

Phase 2: How is it taught? Structure... Twice a day – letter sounds, blending, segmenting, tricky words, applying skills to real reading and writing contexts. Action and sound... Based on multi-sensory approach Pronunciation... no ‘uh’ at the end - soft voice (p, s, m)

Pronunciation Videos for all phonemes are on the School Website

Phase 2: Letter progression s – a – t – p i – n - m – d g – o – c – k ck – e – u – r h – b – f - l A good phonic understanding is one of the key foundations of being a good reader and writer.

Phase 2: Blending and segmenting s a t a t t a p

Phase 3: Blending and segmenting using phase 3 letter combinations s h i p f e e t c h u r c h

Phase 2: Tricky words the was said all are Words that you ‘just have to know’ through on-sight recognition Spot the words in books and in the environment. Wiggle fingers when you hear the word. Matching pairs game Daily practise the was said all are

Helping your child at home............with reading Practise oral blending - use sound talk– its time for b – e – d, let’s put your shoes on your f – ee — t, shall we have some bread and j – a – m? Sing nursery rhymes and play with rhyme – cat, fat, bat I spy...emphasising the initial sound Make collections of things beginning with the same letter Stretch out words slowly, helping your child to identify each sound in turn. Practise recognising tricky words. Discuss the pictures and language used in books to help develop your child’s comprehension skills.

Helping your child at home............with writing Stretch out the word slowly, helping your child to identify each sound in turn. Use magnetic letters to make words. Sound them out to check. Practise letter formation – pencil and paper, white boards, in flour, foam, glitter!! Writing shopping lists Messages for people (post-its) Encourage your child to write the sounds they can hear in words. Accuracy in this is more important than accuracy of the word itself at this stage. I.e. They may write ‘it’ for ‘eat’ or ‘is’ for ‘ice’.

talk to youir child about phonics, and finally... talk to youir child about phonics, model speaking and listening and be enthusiastic about their early attempts to read and write at every opportunity!