Phonics at Belmont Primary School

How we teach phonics at Belmont Key vocabulary Year 1 expectations Outcomes: How we teach phonics at Belmont Key vocabulary Year 1 expectations Phonics screening check Ways you can help at home

Letters and Sounds Letters and Sounds is a phonics resource published by the Department for Education and Skills in 2007. It aims to build children's speaking and listening skills in their own right as well as to prepare children for learning to read by developing their phonic knowledge and skills. It sets out a detailed and systematic programme for teaching phonic skills for children starting by the age of five, with the aim of them becoming fluent readers by age seven.

There are 6 phases in Letters and Sounds. Phase 1 begins in Nursery and concentrates on developing children’s speaking and listening skills and continues through all the years up to Year 2. Phase 2 begins in Reception and children are taught 23 sounds which they can read and write and can start using to blend and segment words. They will also learn 6 Tricky Words.

There are 6 phases in Letters and Sounds. Phase 3 continues in Reception and a further 25 sounds are taught and 12 new Tricky Words. Phase 4 begins in Reception/Year 1 where children now know 42 sounds and Tricky Words. The children apply this learning to their reading and writing. Phase 5 begins in Year 1 and introduces the children to more sounds and Tricky Words. Phase 6 begins in Year 2 and focuses on prefixes, suffixes, teaching of tenses, teaching spelling of longer words.

Correct pronunciation Phonics Correct pronunciation Some of us would have learnt phonics at school and some of us didn’t. To ensure you are saying the same sounds as we are using in school we have put together a hand-out for you. The sounds are either stretchy e.g. ffffffff or bouncy e.g. bbbbbbb and you need to take off the ‘er’ in sounds, for example m and l. This helps your children when they are reading and writing.

Correct pronunciation Phonics Correct pronunciation s Say & stretch sssss. Keep your teeth together & hiss. a Sing & bounce a-a-a-a. Open your mouth wide, as if to take a big bite of an apple. t Say & bounce t-t-t-t as you tick your tongue behind your teeth. p Say & bounce p-p-p-p. Make a light popping sound as you say p-p-p-p. i Sing & bounce i-i-i-i. Make a sharp sound at the back of your throat and smile. n Sing & stretch nnnnnnn. Keep your tongue behind your teeth and say nnnn.

Vocabulary Phoneme - Phonemes are the smallest unit of speech-sounds which make up a word. If you change a phoneme in a word, you would change its meaning. For example, there are three phonemes in the word sit /s/-/i/-/t/. If you change the phoneme /s/ for /f/, you have a new word, fit. If you change the phoneme /t/ in fit for a /sh/, you have a new word, fish - /f/-/i/-/sh/. Grapheme - Graphemes are the written representation of sounds.

Vocabulary Blend – Putting individual sounds together to pronounce a word for reading, for example sh-i-p = ship. Segment – To split up a word into individual phonemes in order to spell and write words, for example goat becomes g-oa-t. Tricky Words – Tricky words are not phonetically decodable, for example called, could, Mrs, Mr, asked, people

Vocabulary Special friends – diagraphs, trigraphs or double letters tt, ck Diagraph – two letters that make one sound e.g. ai as in rain Split diagraph – two letters that make one sound, split up by another letter a-e, e-e, i-e, u-e, o-e Trigraph – three letters that make one sound e.g. ear as in fear

Letter Formation Here at Belmont we use the scheme Read Write Inc to support teaching of phonics. For each sound there is a story to tell so the children remember how to write each letter.

Handwriting m Down Maisie, mountain, mountain a Round the apple and down the leaf. s Slide around the snake. d Round the dinosaurs back, up his neck and down to his feet. t Down the tower and across the tower. i Down the insect’s body and dot for the head. n Down Nobby and over his net. p Down the pirate’s plait, up and around his face. g Round the girl’s face, down her hair and give her a curl. o All around the orange. c Curl around the caterpillar. k Down the kangaroo’s body, tail and leg.

Handwriting Year one children are expected to: Form letters correctly, starting and ending in the correct position Write capital letters and digits of the correct size and in relation to one another Writing letters neatly on the line Descenders go below the line e.g. p, y, q, g, j, Ascenders are tall letters and should touch the line e.g. l, b, h, d, k

Writing in Belmont School

Phase 5 Phonics Children need to learn all the phase 5 sounds:

Phase 5 Phonics A typical phonics lesson follows the same format: Revisit – all the previous sounds/words previously taught Teach – introduce a new sound and/or word Practise – reading words containing the new sound e.g. out loud words, Fred in your head, speedy reading and alien words Apply – writing words and a sentence using the new sounds the children have learnt

Phase 5 Phonics Children will also learn alternative pronunciations of letters e.g. Long vowel sounds a (acorn) e (frequent) i (mind) o (don’t) u (unicorn) a – ant, wasp, after, bacon g – get, magic c – cat, acid ch – chin, school, chef ea – meat, bread ie – tie, belief y – yoghurt, very, gym

Phonics Screening Check in Year 1 The phonics screening check is statutory for all Year 1 children and is designed to confirm whether pupils have learnt phonic decoding skills to an appropriate standard. It is administered in June. The check consists of a list of 40 words – 20 real words and 20 pseudo words. The pass mark is not shared with schools until after the check has been administered but has remained at 32 for the last few years.

Phonics Screening Check in Year 1

Phonics Screening Check in Year 1 The check is carried out on a 1:1 basis with a class teacher. Your child will be asked to read aloud the words one at a time. If your child doesn’t reach the required pass mark at the end of Year 1, they will have the opportunity to resit the test in Year 2. You can practice decoding words including pseudo words in preparation for the screening check. Your child will practice as part of their daily phonics lesson. Further information can be found: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/key-stage-1-assessment-and-reporting-arrangements-ara/phonics-screening-check

How to help at home? Familiarise yourself with the sounds/rhymes/letter formation Say the sounds correctly Practise recalling the phase 5 flash cards at speed Learn to read and spell the tricky words in word wallets Encourage your child to apply their phonics skills when reading and writing at home wherever possible Use the resources provided e.g. sound mats, word mats Read regularly with and to your child Little and often Keep it fun!

Useful websites www.letters-and-sounds.com www.familylearning.org.uk/ www.booktrust.org.uk/ www.oxfordowl.co.uk/ www.readwriteinc.com www.gov.uk/government/publications/key-stage-1-assessment-and-reporting-arrangements-ara/phonics-screening-check www.phonicsplay.co.uk