Reading in the EYFS at Westgate Lower School

rough station ghoti Fish! women Starter- using your knowledge of the english language can you work out what this word says? Give time for discussion then click in each box (not ‘fish’) Does this make it easier? Now reveal word. This is how difficult it is for children learning to read, we can give them the tools in school to be able to decode the majority of words but many don’t follow a set pattern and can be confusing to learners. Our job (parents and teachers) is to reassure, build confidence and read a wide range of books/use a wide range of vocabulary with children.

When is reading taught? Daily morning sessions 15 minutes, increasing through the year And everywhere else, home and school!

What is phonics? Phonics is one of the primary building blocks of reading and writing. Simply put, phonics is the connection between the letter or group of letters and the sound it creates. Without an understanding of the relationship between letters and sounds, reading and consequently writing cannot occur The English language has 26 letters in its alphabet and most experts believe there are 44 letter sounds. If there were 44 letters in our alphabet, then reading would really be simple! Each letter would have its own sound. However, since there are 44 sounds and only 26 letters, some letters have to make more than one sound. I am beginning with phonics as this is the basis of your child’s learning in both reading and writing.

How do the children learn? Highly structured sessions Fast paced Review Teach Practice Apply

What is the curriculum used? Synthetic phonics: teaching reading by first teaching the letter sounds and then building up to blending these sounds together to achieve full pronunciation of whole words (decoding). Practice of decoding the same word several times, puts the word into the store of words we recognise on sight. Meaning of words discussed and understood.

Phases Phase 1 –Activities within Phase 1 seven aspects are designed to help children: 1. listen attentively; 2. enlarge their vocabulary; 3. speak confidently to adults and other children; 4. discriminate phonemes; 5. reproduce audibly the phonemes they hear, in order, all through the word; 6. use sound-talk to segment words into phonemes. Phase 2 – Children move on from oral blending and segmentation to blending and segmenting with single letters e.g. s a t p i n Environmental, instrumental, body percussion, voice, rhythm and rhyme, alliteration, oral blending and segmenting Mock lesson – s pictures draw snake, whats hiding behind, big in air, little on hands, on whiteboards, phoneme cards, Fred fingers stretch squeeze, green cards, Fred, Phase 3– Children learn graphemes comprising of two letters (digraphs) and three letters (trigraphs) e.g ch sh ai ee igh Phase 4 – A phase to consolidate children’s knowledge of graphemes in reading and spelling words containing adjacent consonants and polysyllabic words e.g swim, tent, windmill, shampoo

Key terms Phoneme – the smallest identifiable sound in a word Digraph- two letters that make one sound eg /ai/ Trigraph- three letters that make one sound e.g. /igh/ Split digraph Two letters that make one sound but there is a letter between them – e.g. cake Please use these terms with your children, it makes it easier for them as they learn more complex phonemes. Also use the correct names for letters and their sounds eg not calling an ‘I’ a ‘stick with a dot.’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqhXUW_v-1s Cued articulation

Decoding words Understanding text + = Reading Clarify, predict, summarise, question – key to understand the text. Stories without words build on these skills. Scribing – hung it on traditional, story telling. Traditional tales, repetition familiarity Narrative therapy

The tools we use Home reading book Changed in school – Ash - Tuesday - Oak - Wednesday Reading diary – the place to record what you read at home

How you can help… Value books at home Encourage your child to look for any words they definitely know or letters/digraphs they know in their reading book. By doing this it will give them the confidence to read more fluently if they had chance to skim it first Enjoy reading to them Find something you want to read yourself Talk about the sounds they’re learning Share their school books with them Reading in the environment e.g. road signs, shop names. Scribing their stories/role play and reading it back to them Encourage them to look for any tricky words for instance ‘the’ in a newspaper, magazine or book. Create a poster of tricky words with them by cutting out words from a newspaper Be a role model. Read the book to them and model blending the sounds together. Ask them to help/teach you! Join the Discovery Centre Enjoying and sharing books Experience shows that children benefit hugely by exposure to books from an early age. Right from the start, lots of opportunities should be provided for children to engage with books that fire their imagination and interest. They should be encouraged to choose and peruse books freely as well as sharing them when read by an adult. Enjoying and sharing books leads to children seeing them as a source of pleasure and interest and motivates them to value reading.