1. Welcome to our Phonics Information Session

2. What is phonics? 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. Children are taught to spell by hearing a word and splitting it up into the sounds that make it. This is called ‘segmenting’. Children then use their phonic knowledge to record the letters that represent those sounds in the correct order.

3. Definitions Phoneme: The smallest unit of sound. There are approximately 44 phonemes in English (it depends on different accents). Phonemes can be put together to make words. Grapheme: way of writing down a phoneme. Graphemes can be made up from 1 letter e.g. p, 2 letters e.g. sh, 3 letters e.g. igh Blending- Children blend phonemes together to make a word e.g. r-u-n run Segmenting – Children split the word into sounds to help them write it.

4. Daily phonics Children have a 20 minute phonics lesson each day and they are encouraged to use these strategies to read and write in other lessons.

5. Teach Introduction Objectives and criteria for success Revisit and Review Practise Apply Assess learning against criteria

7. Phonics: Letters and Sounds Teaching of phonics is in 6 discreet phases. As well as the sounds taught at each phase there are also high frequency words’. Some of these words are decodable and some are considered ‘tricky words’. Children need to read these by sight and learn to spell them. Eg. What, she, was

8. Phonics – Phase 1 Phonics is broken down into phases, 1 to 6. Phase 1, which is taught in Nursery, looks at sound discrimination, rhyme, oral blending and oral segmenting.

9. Jolly Phonics Kinaesthetic approach: song, action and visual https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCjJYB07 aSU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCjJYB07 aSU

10. Articulation of phonemes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOW3pB2KwGA Teaching phonics requires a technical skill in enunciation. Each phoneme needs to be articulated clearly and precisely. Each sound needs to be said sharply and clipped: “D” not “DER” “M” not “MER” for accuracy in blending.

11. Phonics – Phase 2 Phase 2 introduces the first set of phonemes and teaches children to blend the sounds together to read whole words.

12. Phonics – Phase 3 Phase 3 teaches another 25 phonemes, most of which are digraphs (two letters making one sound e.g. oi) and some our trigraphs (three letters make one sound e.g. igh).

13. Phonics – Phase 4 Phase 4 teaches children to read and spell words with adjacent consonants e.g. jump or stamp and polysyllabic words (more than one syllable e.g. sandwich)

14. Phonics – Phase 5 Phase 5 teaches children alternative ways of representing sounds they already know e.g. in Phase 3 they learnt ow (cow) and in Phase 5 they will learn ou (loud).

15. Phonics – Phase 6 Phase 6 focuses on becoming fluent readers and accurate spellers by teaching rules for suffixes such as -ing, -ed, -est.

16. Phase 6 Throughout this phase: consolidation of previous phases Develop strategies for learning spellings Focus on comprehension and reading for pleasure Transition from learning to read to reading to learn

18. To add –ed, -ing, -er,–est and –y (or any other suffix beginning with a vowel letter): Drop the –e. smilesmilsmiled

19. To add –ed, -ing, -er and – est: Double the last consonant. poppopp popped

20. Prefixes Letters that go at the beginning of a word and change the meaning.

21. This prefix means not. This prefix means under.

22. there/their/they’re Homophones

23. Learning Platform Look in the Letters and Sounds Room for games and activities http://www.surreymle.org.uk

24. Bug Club

26. Why are the children being screened? Every Year 1 child in the country will be taking the phonics screening check in the same week in June. The aim of the check is to ensure that all children are able to read by the end of year 2. This ‘midpoint check’ will ensure that we have a clear understanding of what the children need to learn in year 2 and to identify children that need additional support.

27. What does the screen entail? Children will be given 40 words to read. 20 of the words are real words and 20 of them are non-words. The non-words or ‘nonsense’ words will have a picture of an alien next to them so children will know they are not real words. Children will be asked to ‘sound out’ a word and blend the sounds together e.g. b-e-g = beg or e- c-t = ect 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.

28. Examples of words

30. When, Where, Who and How? The screening will take place throughout the week beginning Monday 15 th June. It is very important your child is in school during this week. The children will complete the check one at a time in a quiet area of the school. Each Yr 1 class teacher will conduct the screening check for their class. Each check will take about 5 - 10 minutes. In my experience children seem to enjoy this time spent reading words with the teacher but if a child did become distressed the screen would be stopped at that point.

31. The Results In previous years the pass mark has been 32 out of 40. However last year the government decided not to release the pass mark before results were submitted. Once the school has been informed of the pass mark we will be able to inform you of your child’s results. If your child has not achieved the expected result, they will receive additional phonics support in Year 2 and will have a chance to re-sit the phonics screen in the final term of Year 2.

32. What can you do to help? Use your child’s phonics book at home to practise sound recognition and reading of words by sounding out and blending. Use the internet or apps to play phonics games with your child. Some of these games include nonsense words which is good practise for the screening. Here is one of our favourites: Buried Treasure: http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/BuriedTreasure2.html (See hand out)

33. What can you do to help? Encourage your child to ‘sound out’ when reading or writing. Help them to spot where more than one letter work together to make one sound. Digraph- 2 letters making one sound cow Trigraphs- 3 letters making one sound night Split vowel digraphs- 2 vowels with a consonant in-between. spine - i_e make - a_e

34. If English is not your first language Talk and read to your child in your first language Read your child’s reading book with them and practise tricky words Refer to video link for how the phonemes sound in English Talk to your child’s class teacher Bug Club has “read aloud” option on books

35. REMEMBER Phonics is not the only thing needed to become a fluent reader. Please continue to read with your child each night and encourage them to: Sound out unfamiliar words. Spot “tricky words” and know they can’t be sounded out. Re-read to check it makes sense. Use pictures for clues. Ask questions about the book. Read stories to them as well as listening to them read. And most importantly ENJOY READING!

36. Thank you for coming