PHONICS SCREENING CHECK 2015

WHY DO WE TEACH PHONICS?  The ability to read and write well is a vital skill for all children, paving the way for an enjoyable and successful school experience.  Phonics helps children to develop good reading and spelling skills e.g. cat can be sounded out for reading and spelling  We use a synthetic scheme called ‘Letters and Sounds’ as our teaching resource.

PHONICS AT A GLANCE Phonics is… Skills of segmentation and blending Knowledge of the alphabetic code.

PHONICS CONSISTS OF:  Identifying sounds in spoken words  Recognising the common spellings of each sound  Blending sounds into words for reading  Segmenting words into sounds for spelling

SOME DEFINITIONS A Phoneme This is the smallest unit of sound in a word. How many phonemes can you hear in cat ?

A grapheme These are the letters that represent the phoneme. The grapheme could be 1 letter, 2 letters or more! We often refer to these as sound buttons: t Children need to practise recognising the grapheme and saying the phoneme that it represents.

A phoneme you hear A grapheme you see A word always has the same number of phonemes and graphemes!

HOW TO SAY THE SOUNDS  Saying the sounds correctly with your child is extremely important  The way we say sound may well be different from when you were at school  We say the shortest form of the sounds

BLENDING  Recognising the letter sounds in a written word, for example c-u-p and merging or ‘blending’ them in the order in which they are written to pronounce the word ‘cup’

SEGMENTING  ‘Chopping up’ the word to spell it out  The opposite of blending  Identifying the individual sounds in a spoken word (e.g. h-i-m, s-t-or-k) and writing down letters for each sound (phoneme) to form the word him and stork.

SEGMENT AND BLEND THESE WORDS… drep blom gris Nonsense games like this help to build up skills – and are fun!

SEGMENTING ACTIVITY Using ‘sound buttons’ can you say how many phonemes are in each word. shelf dress sprint string

DID YOU GET IT RIGHT? shelf = sh – e – l – f = 4 phonemes dress = d - r - e – ss = 4 phonemes sprint = s – p – r – i – n – t = 6 phonemes string = s – t – r – i – ng = 5 phonemes

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PHONICS SCREENING CHECK What is the phonics screening check?  The phonics screening check will be taken individually by all children in Year 1 in England the week beginning 15 th June.  It is designed to give you information on how your child is progressing in phonics.  It will help to identify whether your child needs additional support at this stage so that they do not fall behind in this vital early reading skill.

WHAT IS IN THE PHONICS SCREENING CHECK?  There will be two sections in this 40-word check and it will assess phonics skills and knowledge learned through Reception, Year 1 and Year 2.  Your child will read up to four words per page to their class teacher  They will probably do the check in one sitting of about 5-10 minutes.  We will make it as low-key as possible – the children will not be informed it’s a “test”

WHAT SORT OF CHECK IS IT AND IS IT COMPULSORY?  It is a school-based check to make sure that your child receives any additional support promptly, should they need it.  There will be a few practice words first to make sure your child understands the activity.  If we feel your child will not be able to access this test we will dis-apply them and get them ready for the re-test at the end of YR2.

WHAT WILL IT CHECK? It will check that your child can:  Sound out and blend graphemes in order to read simple words.  Read phonically decodable one and two syllable words eg cat, sand, windmill.  Read a selection of nonsense words, which are referred to as pseudo words.

WHAT ARE NONSENSE OR PSEUDO WORDS AND WHY ARE THEY INCLUDED?  These are words that are phonically decodable but are not actual words with associated meaning e.g brip, snorb.  Pseudo words are included in the check specifically to assess whether your child can decode a word using phonics skills and not their memory.  The pseudo words will be shown to your child with a picture of a monster and they will be asked to tell us what sort of monster it is by reading the word. This not only makes the check a bit more fun, but provides the children with a context for the nonsense word which is independent from any existing vocabulary they may have. Crucially, it does not provide any clues, so your child just has to be able to decode it.

IS THERE A PASS MARK?  The check is not about really about passing or failing but is checking that appropriate progress is being made.  The pass mark last year was 32 out of 40 (80%) You will receive a letter informing you how your child performed in the test.  Children progress at different speeds so not reaching the threshold score does not necessarily mean there is a serious problem. Some children do not need to use phonics to help them read and sometimes good readers do not pass the phonics screening check.  Your child will re-sit the check the following summer term.  As yet, the government have not revealed the pass mark for this Summer’s screening check.

WHAT IS HAPPENING IN SCHOOL TO PREPARE THE CHILDREN? Regular phonics, in ability groups – daily in Year 1; three times each week during Year 2 Regular exposure to pseudo words during these sessions Daily “Monster Mash” – nonsense words with Egbert Additional support for a few children

WHAT CAN I DO TO HELP MY CHILD? You can find help at these websites (click on ‘For Home’ them click on right arrow of Highlights to find ‘Phonics Made Easy’ the ‘Say the sounds’ page is useful) go to Free Phonicsplay Parents page and access games and information to help you and your child

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 Re-read to check it makes sense. Use pictures for clues. Ask questions about the book. And most importantly ENJOY READING!