How to help at home

Interested in supporting your childs essential literacy skills at home?These slides include some useful advice to help you to work with us in this. Literacy:-Reading (and phonics)WritingCommunication

Better literacy skills means better progress and achievement across all subjects.Most important things Talking and listening Reading with your childHighlighting interesting examples and the usefulness of reading, writing and communication skills in the world around us.

You could also introduce language games, quizzes and competitionsPHONICS

Support correct pronunciation of sounds.Support a wide, varied and appropriate vocabulary.

We all need to use the same language at home and at school.

Little and often is the key. Does not have to be formal.

Link it to your childs interests.PHONEMEThe smallest unit of sound in a word.

There are 44 phonemes that we teach. The 44 phonemes/b//d//f//g//h//j//c//l//m//n//ng//p//r//s//t//v//w//y//z//th//th//ch//sh//s (je)//a//e//i//o//u//ai//ee//igh//oa//ew//oo//ar//ir//or//er//ow//oi/ /air//ear//ure/

6GRAPHEMELetters representing a phoneme

e.g.

c ai igh Children need to practise recognising the grapheme and saying the phoneme that it represents.BLENDING

Recognising the letter sounds in a written word, for examplec-u-p and merging or blending them in the order in which they are written to pronounce the word cup.

Encourage blending words with single phonemes and then move on to .DIGRAPHS where 2 letters make 1 soundll ss zz oa aiTRIGRAPHS where 3 letters that make 1 soundigh dgePhoneme identification activities you could try this with words your child reads incorrectly.Have a go with the words below:shelfdresssprintString

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

TRICKY WORDSWords that are not phonically decodeable

e.g. was, the, I

Words like these still use graphemes to represent sounds phonics- but less frequently.Many of these words are on the Catch All Spellings Chart and it might be useful to practise spelling and reading these words to learn them.

The more unusual graphemes:Ithecomeofany becausewomancouldyouthroughsure walkedmore thoughtdoesyoungfourbhajiwhobadgertablegnat, machinerhinoscent.,castleregime, collage, revisionspecial, sure, schedule, pension, tissue, passion,clothes, xylophonemosquepicture calledcoughghost, guest, leaguelaughgreat, rein,eight,chalet,they.bear. Their, where.half,are,laugh, heart,said,says,frendspeople, police,piecezero,really, here,wereverandah, little, thorough, colour, metre, sulphurearth,wereorange,build,gymheight, eye,tries, buybecause, coughgoes, thoughbouyflu fruittourplough

Now you have the knowledge.Help your child to know all of the phonic sounds and spellings for them many sounds have multiple spellings.Read as much as possible with your child and yourself when your childs around to show that you value reading.Lots and lots of encourage and praise a good guess is a good start and usually part of the word is being spelt or read correctly so praise that.Ask for information from the school if you want to know more.

Useful websiteswww.parentsintouch.co.uk

www.bbc.co.uk/schools/parents

www.jollylearning.co.uk/

www.focusonphonics.co.uk/www.syntheticphonics.com