1. Teaching and Learning Phonics at RA Butler
Tuesday 29th November 2016

2. Aims JC To explain why we have made a change to the way we
teach phonics.
To share how phonics is now taught.
To develop parents’ confidence in helping their children with phonics and reading
To teach the basics of phonics and some useful phonics terms
To outline the different stages in phonic development
To show examples of activities and resources we use to teach phonics JC

3. Letters and Sounds
A high quality phonics resource produced and recommended by the government
Takes account of the best practice seen in the most successful early years settings and schools. JC

4. Why teach phonics? JC
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

5. + Phonics is all about using … skills for reading and spelling
Segmenting and blending
knowledge of the alphabet + JC
Learning phonics will help your child to become a good reader and writer.

6. Daily Phonics Sessions with their class teacherJC
Every child in FS2 and KS1 learns daily phonics with their class teacher.
Phonics gradually progresses to learning spellings – rules etc.
Children in KS2 will still be talking about phonics, but more closely linked to spelling rather than reading.
Every day the children have 20 minute sessions of phonics with their class teacher.
•Pitched high with a high level of challenge included
It is a fast paced approach
Lessons encompass a range of games, songs and rhymes
Support and interventions put in place quickly to support those children who are not keeping pace with the class (take place in the afternoon)
We use the Letters and Sounds planning document to support the teaching.
There are 6 phonics phases which the children work through

7. Phonic terms your child will learn at school
Phonemes: The smallest units of sound that are found within a word.
A phoneme is something you hear. JC
Phonemes -
How many phonemes can you hear in cat?

8. Grapheme: The spelling of the sound e.g. th
A grapheme is what you see
Children need to practise recognising the grapheme and saying the phoneme that it represents. JC
The grapheme could be 1 letter, 2 letters or more! We often refer to these as sound buttons:
t ai igh
Demo on the flip chart using sound buttons

9. Digraph: Two letters that make one sound when read e.g. sh
Trigraphs: Three letters that make one sound e.g. igh
CVC: Stands for consonant, vowel, consonant e.g c a t
Tricky words: Words that cannot easily be decoded, sometimes referred to as ‘red’ words. JC

10. Sound buttons
Using ‘sound buttons’ can you say how many phonemes are in each word?
shelf
dress
sprint
string JC
Answers on next slide

11. 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 JC

12. Phase 1: Getting ready for phonics
Begun in pre-school but continued throughout EYFS & KS1
1. Tuning into sounds
2. Listening and remembering sounds
3. Talking about sounds PT
Will include activities such as:
Music and movement
Rhythm and rhyme
Sound effects
Speaking and listening skills

13. Phase 2: Learning phonemes to read and write simple words
Children will learn their first 19 phonemes:
Set 1: s a t p Set 2: i n m d
Set 3: g o c k Set 4: ck (as in duck) e u r
Set 5: h b l f ff (as in puff) ll (as in hill) ss (as in hiss) PT
They will use these phonemes to read and spell simple “consonant-vowel-consonant” (CVC) words:
sat, tap, dig, duck, rug, puff, hill, his
All these words contain 3 phonemes but not necessarily 3 letters.

14. Saying the sounds PT
Sounds should be articulated clearly and precisely.
They should be pure sounds and not repeated.
Saying the sounds correctly with your child is extremely important
We refer to letters by the sound they make rather than the letter name to begin with (begins in phase 3)
The way we say sound may well be different from when you were at school
We say the shortest form of the sounds
Some sounds are short and some are stretchy e.g. b is a short bouncy sound, whereas f is a stretchy sound

15. Simple Speed Sounds chartPT
Read across whole chart

16. Segmenting and Blending
Children need to be able to hear a whole word and say every sound that they hear.
e.g. If the teacher says ‘dog’ the child should be able to say ‘d o g – dog’
Blending:
Children need to be able to hear the separate sounds in a word and then blend them together to say the whole word.
e.g. If the teacher says ‘c a t’ the child should be able to say ‘c a t – cat’ JC

17. Segmenting
bed = /b/ /e/ /d/
Blending:
/t/ /i/ /n/ = tin JC

18. Phase 3: Learning the long vowel phonemes
They will learn another 26 phonemes:
j, v, w, x, y, z, zz, qu
ch, sh, th, ng, ai, ee, igh, oa, oo, ar, or, ur, ow, oi, ear, air, ure, er
They will use these phonemes (and the ones from Phase 2) to read and spell words:
chip, shop, thin, ring, pain, feet, night,
boat, boot, look, farm, fork, burn,
town, coin, dear, fair, sure JC
Children will enter phase 3 once they know the first 19 phonemes and can blend and segment to read and spell CVC words. (usually in EYFS)

19. Phase 4: Introducing consonant clusters: reading and spelling words with four or more phonemes
Phase 4 doesn’t introduce any new phonemes.
It focuses on reading and spelling longer words with the phonemes they already know. CCVC (black), CCCVC (strong), CVCC (felt), CCVCC (blend) AN
Children move into phase 4 when they know all the phonemes from phases 2 and 3 and can use them to read and spell simple words (blending to read and segmenting to spell). (usually in EYFS)

20. Phase 5 (usually Yr 1) Teach new graphemes for reading
ay, ou, ie, ea, oy, ir, ue, aw, wh, ph, ew, oe, au, a-e, e-e, i-e, o-e, u-e
Learn alternative pronunciations of graphemes (the same grapheme can represent more than one phoneme):
Fin/find, hot/cold, cat/cent, got/giant, AN
but/put, cow/blow, tie/field, eat/bread, farmer/her, hat/what, yes/by/very, chin/school/chef, out/shoulder/could/you.

21. Learning all the variations!
Learning that the same phoneme can be represented in more than one way:
burn
first
term
heard
work AN
Read the words – emphasise that they all sound the same but are spelt in different ways.

22. Learning all the variations!
Learning that the same grapheme can represent more than one phoneme:
meat bread
he bed
bear hear
cow low AN

23. Teaching the split digraph
A split diagraph is a two-letter sound that has another letter in the middle.
tie time
toe tone
cue cube
pie pine AN
We don’t call it ‘magic e’ or ‘modifying e’

24. Phase 6 (usually Yr 2)
Phase 6 focuses on spellings and learning rules for spelling alternatives. Children look at syllables, base words, and mnemonics. AN
Children will learn about past tense, rules for adding ‘ing’, ‘ed, ‘er’, ‘est’, and irregular verbs, plural rules,
‘tion’ and ‘sion’ words
Silent letters
le, el, al, il at the end of words
Suffixes e.g. -ness, -ful, -less,
Contractions e.g. Can’t, couldn’t, hasn’t

25. Structure of a typical lesson
Revisit/Review
Teach
Practise
Apply JC
Revisit/Review - practise previously learned graphemes
Teach - Teach new graphemes; Teach tricky words
Practise - Practise blending and reading words with the new GPC. Practice segmenting and spelling words with the new GPC
Apply - Read or write a sentence using one or more HF words and words containing new graphemes.

26. Typical Phase 2 lesson Recap previously taught phonemes PT
Revisit/Review
Recap previously taught phonemes
Teach
Teach new grapheme
Teach tricky words
Practise
Practise blending/reading words and segmenting/spelling words with the new GPC (Grapheme Phoneme correspondence)
Apply
Read a sentence using one or more high frequency words and words containing new grapheme.

27. A typical week in Phase 2 PT

28. Typical Phase 3 or 5 lessonAN
Revisit/Review
Sing the alphabet song (a way to learn the letter names)
Recap previously taught phonemes
Teach
Teach new graphemes
Teach tricky words
Practise
Practise blending/reading words and segmenting/spelling words with the new GPC (Grapheme Phoneme correspondence)
Apply
Read or write a sentence using one or more high frequency words and words containing new grapheme.

29. A typical week in Phase 3 or 5AN
Graphemes: about 8 new graphemes for reading per week: j, v, w, x, y, z, zz, qu
Discrete phonics teaching: Practise recognition and recall of Phase 2 & 3 graphemes as they are learned. Teach new graphemes for reading. Practise reading and spelling words with adjacent consonants and words with newly learned graphemes.
Teach reading the words: to, the, no, go, I, into, we, me
Teach spelling the words: to, the.
Practise reading and spelling High Frequency words.
Practise reading and spelling monosyllabic words.
Practise reading sentences.
Practise writing sentences.

30. Guided reading
In Year 1 & Year 2 after their daily 20 minute phonic input the children complete a carousel of activities.
Each week every child reads as part of a guided group with their teacher. AN
Each week they will have a guided spelling session with their TA – learning and practising the new spellings and being tested on the previous week’s.
Across the week they will also complete different independent activities including reading comprehension tasks, phonic games, spelling practise (LCWC), phoneme/grapheme spotting etc

31. Tracking and progress JC
Before we made the move to Letters and sounds we assessed all the children so that we knew where to pitch our first lessons.
Children are continually assessed during the lesson and briefly at the end of each session to ensure understanding and good progression.
We will complete end of phase progress checks and also checks at the end of each term.
Support sessions put in place for those that need it.
Year 1 Phonics screening check.

32. Year 1 Phonic Screening
A screening check for Year 1 to encourage schools to pursue a rigorous phonics programme.
Aimed at identifying the children who need extra help are given the support.
Assesses decoding skills using phonics
40 items to be read (20 real words, 20 pseudo words) JC

33. Is there anything I can do at home?JC

34. At home... Read everyday with your child if possible
Help your child practise their reading words (EYFS)
Help your child practise their spellings (these sheets do not need to come back to school)
Play ‘I spy’
Continue to play with magnetic letters, using some two-grapheme (letter) combinations, eg: r-ai-n = rain blending for reading
rain = r-ai-n segmenting for spelling
Praise your child for trying out words
Look at tricky words
Look for phonic games online
Play pairs with words and pictures JC

35. Learning to read should be fun for both children and parents.
Don’t forget…
Learning to read should be fun for both children and parents. JC

36. Any questions?