Where it all begins…. Reading skills are like building blocks. To be able to read well children need to gradually piece together all of the blocks to develop confidence and fluency.

Love of books… At home from a very early age - Introduce books to your children. Read books and sing nursery rhymes with your children. Share stories often and point at pictures. Talk about anything and everything using varying vocabulary. Building a love of books at school – Read books to the children daily in small groups or in a whole class setting and also one to one.

Read stories with enthusiasm, expression and passion to develop the children’s interests. Talk to the children about their favourite stories. Use and introduce books into the different areas of learning. Make books, props and story sacks accessible in the children’s play so that they can re-tell and act out popular stories that have been read to them by an adult. Making class books with the children reflecting topics and the children’s interests. Sharing books.

Phonics Jolly phonics is the teaching of the letter sounds (phonemes) as well as the letters name (grapheme). When 2 letters together make a new sound this is a digraph. E.g. ie Children then use these sounds to blend words (put sounds together for reading) and segment words (break sounds apart for spelling).

Nursery phonics In nursery we concentrate on the children’s listening skills. There are 7 aspects that we focus on… ■ Aspect 1: General sound discrimination – environmental sounds. ■ Aspect 2: General sound discrimination – instrumental sounds. ■ Aspect 3: General sound discrimination – body percussion. ■ Aspect 4: Rhythm and rhyme. ■ Aspect 5: Alliteration. ■ Aspect 6: Voice sounds. ■ Aspect 7: Oral blending and segmenting.

We begin by teaching the children basic listening skills. Then use these to play lots of games and complete fun activities in small groups developing the children’s ability to focus in on sounds. Next we introduce the single sounds. We use puppets, jingles, games and displays to capture the children’s interest and help them retain the sounds. Letters in their play. Introduce basic blending of sounds to build words (robots).

Reception Phonics Revise listening skills and phonemes. Introduce tricky words. Introduce blends (digraphs). Use the sound and letter correspondence to build CVC words

Year 1 Still revising listening skills, phonemes, blends (digraphs) Developing children’s knowledge by introducing trigraphs (three letters together that make one sound) e.g. igh Use blending to a higher level, blending longer words. Look at alternative ways to make sounds.

night

tie

ninenine

Vocabulary Getting children talking! Modelling varied language and vocabulary. Talking about how things taste/smell/feel/work etc. Describing how people feel. Giving children experiences that provide the opportunity for lots of exciting talk. Using open ended questions.

In school when reading to/with children – We use open ended prompt questions that encourage the children to talk about the story, characters, context and plot. This develops the skill of reading for meaning in older children. Before the words comes the pictures. Key words from ALL topics on displays, written on the board etc to develop children’s awareness of words in the environment. Tricky words are displayed and revised through games regularly to develop children’s ability to read them by sight. Use a wide range of reading materials to develop the children’s knowledge of the language needed in different types of reading. E.g. non fiction fact books, menus, lists, picture books.

Grammar and Punctuation It all starts with modelling! Point out punctuation to children and speak about it during group reading and one to one experiences. What difference does it make to the way we read? Y1 begin to learn the meaning of punctuation marks and how to use them in their writing continuing and developing their knowledge of them in their reading.

Wider breadth of reading material Reading for a purpose as well as reading for enjoyment. Reading about current affairs in our society. Reading in all areas of the curriculum. Reading much more than just their home reader and ORT book. Reading groups, sharing stories with friends and a love of the local library.

Something to remember… Every child is different and develops and learns in different ways. Although the teaching of phonics and reading skills offers progression through each year, every child’s learning journey is different. Children are supported and challenged at their level in each year group and flexibility in classes allows consolidation and practise of previous learning as well as challenge and development for those who are ready. Reading is a process which shouldn’t be rushed. Children need repetition to embed the many different building blocks involved in learning how to read.