Mrs Broers

What is the Phonics screening? The checks consist of 40 words and nonsense words that your child will be asked to read with a teacher. Nonsense words (or pseudo words) are a collection of letters that will follow phonics rules your child has been taught, but don’t mean anything – your child will need to read these with the correct sounds to show that they understand the phonics rules behind them. Each nonsense word is presented with a picture of a monster / alien, as if the word were their name (and so your child doesn't think the word is a mistake because it doesn't make sense!).

What are children expected to do? The focus of the screening is to check what sounds children know and whether they are applying them correctly when reading. Children will be asked to sound out a word, such as ‘s-t-r-i-p’ and blend it together ‘strip’.

Nonsense words and decoding One of the many skills when learning to read is decoding. In order to be secure in reading children must be able to use the skills to decode words.

Let’s have a go… Sound out the word using robot arms and blend it together train smart growl crunch Crept Frost floating

How to support your child at home… Practise little and often to increase your child’s fluency. Play sound snap Memory game Word hunt around your home or garden Sound of the day I spy… Spot the digraph/trigraph in words and circle Give your child a word. Sound out the word together and blend Watch the video on our website with your child http://www.limetree.kingston.sch.uk/Phonics/

Time to have a look at some phonic activities!