Year 1 Phonics

What is Phonics? Phonics is the key that unlocks the door to reading and writing.

The journey so far… In Reception, children have learnt to recognise 44 different phonemes, and the graphemes that represent them. A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound in a word (for example /c/, /oa/, /igh/). A grapheme is the letter or letters that represent a phoneme (for example the letters s and h make /sh/, a and r make /ar/).

The 44 phonemes /b//d//f//g//h//j//k//l//m//n//ng/ /p//r//s//t//v//w//y//z//th/ /ch/ /sh//zh//a//e//i//o//u//ae//ee//ie//oe/ /ue//oo//ar//ur//au//er//ow//oi//air//ear//ure/

In Reception… Children have learnt to blend phonemes to read CVC words. p – a – t = pat s – oa – p = soap n – igh – t = night They have learnt to segment CVC words for spelling. r ai n h a t

Children have learnt the letter names. They have are also able to read and spell some tricky words. Tricky words are words that cannot be decoded by sounding them out. For example… some, what, my, little.

Now they are in Year 1… Children will continue to practise reading and spelling words with adjacent consonants. For example, w – i – n – d = wind p – ai – n – t = paint b – r- u – sh = brush t – w – i – s – t = twist And they will practise reading and spelling 2 syllable words. For example, lunchbox = l-u-n-ch / b-o-x starlight = s-t-ar / l-igh-t

Throughout Year 1… Children will learn new graphemes for phonemes they know. They will learn alternative pronunciations for graphemes they know.

New Graphemes for Phonemes they know… Children have learnt that the grapheme ai makes the phoneme /ai/. They will now learn that there are other ways of spelling the phoneme /ai/. For example, ay – stay a-e – cake They will learn rules for the alternative spellings, and be encouraged to spot patterns in the way words are spelt. Eg, bake, cake, fake, Jake, lake, make, rake, wake

Alternative graphemes taught… KnowNewKnowNew aiay (day) a-e (game)owou (found) eeea (bead) ey (trolley) e-e (Pete) oioy (boy) ighie (tie) i-e (bike)eareer (beer) ere (here) oaoe (toe) o-e (bone) ow (slow) airear(pear),are(care) ooue (blue) ew (chew) u-e (rude) wwh (when) oraw (lawn) au (author)fph (phone) urir (bird) er (fern)

Alternative pronunciation ifin, findeaeat, head ohot, botherfarmer, term ccat, cityahat, what ggot, giantyyes, by, very ubut, musicchchin, school, chef ownow, snowouout, soup, mould ietie, field

By the End of Year 1 Children will become quicker at recognising graphemes of more than one letter in words and blending the phonemes they represent to read. When spelling words, they will choose the appropriate graphemes to represent the phonemes. They will learn how to read and spell more tricky words. They will undertake the Year 1 Phonics Screening Check.

Year 1 Phonics screening Check The Year 1 phonics screening check is a short assessment to confirm whether individual pupils have learnt phonic decoding to an appropriate standard. It will identify the children who need extra help so they can be given support by their school to improve their reading skills. They will then be able to retake the check so that schools can track pupils until they are able to decode.

The phonics screening check will take place in June. The class teacher will administer the test. It will be a short, simple screening check to make sure that all pupils have grasped fundamental phonic skills. It comprises a list of 40 words – 20 real words and 20 non-words, which a child will read one-to-one with their teacher. The threshold in 2012 and 2013 was 32 words out of 40. Children need to read at least 32 out of the 40 words in order to ‘pass’ the screening check.

‘Non-words’ are included because they will be new to all pupils, so there will not be a bias to those with a good vocabulary knowledge or visual memory of words. The non-words are presented alongside a picture of an imaginary creature, and children can be told the non- word is the name of that type of creature. This helps children to understand the non-word should not be matched to their existing vocabulary. Pupils who can read non-words should have the skills to decode almost any unfamiliar word.

Here as an example of the screening check:

Now you have the knowledge…. Read as much as possible to your child. Listen to your child read every day. Little and often is the key - make it fun, not formal! Encourage and praise your child’s efforts. Ask your child’s teacher if you want to know more.

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