A Guide To Phonics How to help your child learn to read

Why all the fuss?

• Tight link between academic success and number of words spoken to child by parents up to age of 3.

• Talk a lot families vs Not talk a lot families

• Constant chatter, build on child’s speech, asking questions, constant praise, approx 1,000 stories

Role of school

• Cannot emulate constant 1-1 chatter of home

• Use our time carefully – planned talk

• Be aspirational with our use of language

• Use partner work and feedback effectively

• Work in small groups

• Give children experiences: opera, owl man

Synthetic Phonics

• The ability to convert a letter or letter group

into sounds

• These are then blended together or

synthesized into words

Synthetic Phonics

• English language has 44 sounds (phonemes)

• Represented by 26 letters (graphemes)

• Confidence in this = rapid decoding (reading)

• Aim is for 100 words per minute

Synthetic Phonics

• Use sounds to help writing (encoding)

• Follows reversibility principle

• Using it repetitively adds words to

orthographic store

Read Write Inc

• One of many programmes: Jolly Phonics, Focus

on Phonics, Simply Phonics

• Created by Ruth Miskin

• Links reading, writing and ambitious language

Read to Learn • To read you need

o Good word recognition o Good oral language comprehension • Learn to read phase limited to age of 7 o Books have fewer words than they comprehend • Read to learn phase is life long o Books now drive vocabulary growth

Complex Alphabetic

Code

English Language

• Most complicated language in the world

• 44 sounds but only 26 letters

• Many sounds written in more than one way

• Over 150 graphemes to learn

Simple approach

• RWI starts with a simple code

• One way to read/write each of the 44 sounds

• Still able to write many other words:

o trayn, mayk, dreem, kee, smowk, gowt

5 Principles of RWI

1. Pace

• Aim of the program is to be off the program

• 100% pupil participation in lessons

• Use of silent signals: stop, magnet, MTYT,

• 1,2,3 = stand, walk to chairs, sit and read

Praise

2. Praise… a lot!

• Praise Phrases: not good… wondrous, not

great… phenomenal

• Praise Actions: fireworks, ketchups, round of a

claws, cowboy, marshmallow claps, Elvis

Focused Teaching

3. Purpose

• Every activity has a purpose and children know it

• Modelling – language, expectations, behaviour

• Think out loud – planned chatter. Shows how

we make decisions about what characters are

feeling, best words, and what is happening.

100% Participation

4. Participation

• Consistent partner work to involve all

• No hands up

• Modelling of behaviour/desired outcomes

• Feedback: choose two, paraphrase, choral,

popcorn

Love Reading

5. Passion

• We enjoy teaching the lessons

• Children enjoy taking part

• Passionate that all children will read

• Greater the passion, faster the progress!

Fred Talk

Blending

• Children learn simple sounds

• Need to be able to blend them together

• Need to pronounce sounds clearly

• Use exaggeration

• This is called ‘Fred Talk’

How It Works

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEzfpod5w_Q&feature=related

Here is a session in action…

Lesson outline

• Each lesson follows a very similar format:

1. Say the sound

2. Relate sound to picture cards

3. Show how to write the sound

4. Use Fred Talk to read words

Revision

• As sounds build up children revise what they

have learnt

• Use of Fred Fingers

• Photocopy of sheets to practise at home

Grotty Graphemes

• Not all words are nice and easy to sound

• RWI highlights these to children

• Green words = regular sand, hat, much

• Red words = have a grotty grapheme your,

was, said

Story Books

Decodable Texts

• Reading scheme runs alongside lessons

• Means children can decode stories

• Still have ambitious vocabulary

• Read story three times: decode, understand and

greater depth

Reading & Writing

• Mixture of nine reading and nine writing

activities

• Uses ‘build a sentence’ to support writing

• Reinforces punctuation

• High expectations – Reception can be writing a

page by Christmas

Teacher Technique • Use of forced alternatives: did you feel grumpy or

miserable?

• Constant pushing of the vocabulary – second layer

language

• Build comprehension skills by asking children to:

Find it… Prove it…

How You Can Help

Talk All Day

• Model quality words to use in context:

o “Alex don’t dawdle… it’s time to leave!”

• Give the children choices when answering

o Not “How is the pear”

o Instead “Is the pear crunchy or squashy?”

Practise & Praise

• Constantly praise your children for their

reading

• Can order a parent’s DVD – sign sheet

• Find the sounds on Youtube

o Search: Read Write Inc Sounds

Stories & Rhymes

• Read a story every day

• Mixture of myths, fables, fairy tales

• Read them different versions of the same

• Read them several times

• Use ‘What if’ questions

o What if the kind king was a wicked, nasty man

Our Commitment

Reading by 6

• Passionate about importance of reading

• Every child a reader by the age of 6

• Support for those who need it

• Instill a passion for reading in the children

• High expectations for the language and writing

Big Steps

• All staff trained in delivery of program

• Impact on delivery of all lessons

• Prioritize resources: so far £12,000

• Reorganize staff roles and responsibilities

• We have a real belief this will work!

Any Questions?