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Phonics

Phonics: A vehicle into the world of reading.

‘The more you read, the more things you will know. The more you know, the more places you will go.” 

Dr Seuss

Children who read regularly or are read to regularly are being provided the opportunity to open the doors to so many different worlds!

More importantly, reading will give your child the tools to become independent life-long learners.

We can achieve this together through:

  • Read Write Inc - a program to help to your child learn a phonological awareness and to decode for reading at school
  • Encouraging children to develop a love of books by reading to them daily, at home and at school
  • Giving children access to a wide range of books at school and at home

 

At Monkhouse Primary, we use Read Write Inc Phonics (RWI) to give your child the best possible start with their reading development. We have chosen Read Write Inc to provide a daily synthetic and systematic programme which allows us to teach phonics in an interactive and engaging way. The expectation is that all children will become fluent readers and have secure word building and recognition skills by the end of Key Stage 1. Mrs Williams is our Read Write Inc lead, so if you have questions about RWI and the teaching of phonics, contact school who can refer you to her. 

 

What is Read Write Inc?

Read Write Inc (RWI) is a phonics complete literacy programme which helps all children learn to read fluently and at speed so they can focus on developing their skills in comprehension, vocabulary and spelling.  The programme is designed for children aged 4-7. However, at MHPS we begin the programme in Nursery and will continue teaching RWI to children beyond the age of 7, as we use a stage not age approach. RWI was developed by Ruth Miskin and more information on this can be found at https://ruthmiskin.com/en/find-out-more/parents/.

 

How will RWI be taught?

All children are assessed regularly by our RWI lead.  From these assessments children are grouped into stages, where they work with peers on the same stage.  

 

Nursery & Reception

When appropriate, children will be introduced to the initial sounds in short five minutes sessions.

In Reception all children will learn how to ‘read’ the sounds in words and how those sounds can be written down.

 

Reading

The children:

  • Learn 44 sounds and the corresponding letters/letter groups using simple picture prompts – see below
  • Learn to read words using Fred talk and sound blending
  • Read from a range of storybooks and non-fictions books matched to their phonic knowledge
  • Work well with partners
  • Develop comprehension skills in stories by answering 'Find It' and 'Prove It' discussion questions

 

Writing

The children:

  • Learn to write and form the letters/letter groups which represent the 44 sounds with the help of fun phrases
  • Learn to write words by using Fred Talk
  • Learn to build sentences by practising sentences out loud before they write 

 

Talking

The children work in pairs so that they:

  • Practise every activity with their partner
  • Take turns in talking and reading to each other
  • Develop ambitious vocabulary
  • Answer questions with their partner to develop comprehension and confidence in discussing what they have read. 

 

Progressing through the stages

Children follow the same format as Early Years, but will work on complex sounds and read books appropriate to their reading level. Daily sessions of RWI phonics last 30 minutes  

 

Five key principles underpin the teaching in all Read Write Inc. sessions:  

Purpose – know the purpose of every activity and share it with the children, so they know the one thing they should be thinking about

Participation – ensure every child participates throughout the lesson. Partnership work is fundamental to learning

Praise – ensure children are praised for effort and learning, not ability

Pace – teach at an effective pace and devote every moment to teaching and learning

Passion – be passionate about teaching so children can be engaged emotionally.

 

Children will be taught how to read as follows:

Before you start to teach your child, practice saying the sounds below. These are the sounds we use to speak in English and we use the pure sounds to support sound blending for reading. Children initially begin using pictures for each sound, this will help children recognise the sound and then form the shape of the sound. 

 

Fred Talk

We use pure sounds (‘m’ not’ muh’,’s’ not ‘suh’, etc.) so that your child will be able to blend the sounds into words more easily.

At school we use a puppet called Fred who is an expert on sounding out words! we call it, ‘Fred Talk’. E.g. m-o-p, c-a-t, m-a-n, sh-o-p, b-l-a-ck.

The children are taught the sounds in 3 sets.

 

Set 1 Sounds are taught in the following order together with rhymes to help children form the letters correctly and instantly recognise sounds ready for blending.

Set 1

Sound

Rhyme

m

Down Maisie then over the two mountains. Maisie, mountain, mountain.

a

Round the apple, down the leaf.

s

Slide around the snake

d

Round the dinosaur's back, up his neck and down to his feet.

t

Down the tower, across the tower,

i

Down the insects body, dot for the head.

n

Down Nobby and over the net.

p

Down the plait, up and over the pirates face.

g

Round the girls face, down her hair and give her a curl

o

All around the orange

c

Curl around the caterpillar

k

Down the kangaroos body, tail and leg

u

Down and under the umbrella, up to the top and down to the puddle

b

Down the laces, over the toe and touch the heel

f

Down the stem and draw the leaves

e

Slice into the egg, go over the top, then under the egg

l

Down the long leg

h

Down the horse's head to the hooves and over his back

sh

Slither down the snake, then down the horse's head to the hooves and over his back

r

Down the robot's back, then up and curl

j

Down his body, curl and dot

v

Down a wing, up a wing

y

Down a horn, up a horn and under the yak's head.

w

Down, up, down, up the worm.

th

Down the tower, across the tower, then down the horse’s head to the hooves and over his back

z

Zig-zag-zig, down the zip.

ch

Curl around the caterpillar, , then down the horse's head to the hooves and over his back

qu

Round the queen’s head, up to her crown, down her hair and curl

x

Cross down the arm and leg and cross the other way

ng

A thing on a string

nk

I think I stink

 

The children are then taught Set 2 Sounds - the long vowels. When they are very confident with all of set 1 and 2 they are taught Set 3 Sounds.

 

Long  vowel sound

Set 2 Speed Sound cards

Teach these first

Set 3 Speed Sound cards

ay

ay: may I play

a-e: make a cake

ai: snail in the rain

ee

ee: what can you see

ea: cup of tea

e: he me we she be

igh

igh: fly high

i-e: nice smile

ow

ow: blow the snow

o-e: phone home

ao: goat in a boat

oo

oo: poo at the zoo

u-e: huge brute

ew: chew the stew

oo

oo: look at a book

 

 

ar

ar: start the car

 

 

or

or: shut the door

aw: yawn at dawn

 

air

air: that’s not fair

are: share and care

 

ir

ir: whirl and twirl

ur: nurse for a purse

er: a better letter

ou

ou: shout it out

ow: brown cow

 

oy

oy: toy for a boy

oi: spoil the boy

 

ire

 

ire: fire fire!

 

ear

 

ear: hear with your ear

 

ure

 

ure: sure it’s pure?

 

Nonsense words (Alien words)- What 'a load' or nonsense! 

As well as learning to read and blend real words children will have plenty of opportunities to apply their sound recognition skills on reading ‘Nonsense words’. These words will also feature heavily in the Year One Phonics Screening check in the summer term.  These words provide endless opportunities for children to apply and practice their thinking in a range of different contexts.  

 

Within all the RWI sessions/books children will be exposed to red and green words to learn to help them to become confident and fluent readers. Red words are words that are not decodable and our children soon become familiar with the phrase, “you can’t Fred a red”.  Children will also access challenge words to extend their vocabulary. Green words are linked to the sounds they have been learning and are easily decodable.

Dots and dashes represent the sound each letter makes.

During the RWI session children will read the book three times and at each new reading they will have plenty of opportunities to practise using their developing comprehension skills.

 

To help at home:

As part of our phonics programme, each child will take home a weekly RWInc home reader which will be within their phonic decoding capabilities. This further develops consistency in phonics and reading with children accessing comparable texts linked to the text they are reading in school.  Parents are encouraged to listen to their children reading these books a few times across the week, to support fluency and familiarity with the text, and ask questions on the text to support their understanding.  These will be changed weekly by the RWInc group leader.  Where children are not accessing whole texts, they will receive a RWInc blending book which encourages them to blend cvc words initially.  This would usually be across some of EYFS i.e. Summer term Nursery and into Autumn term Reception year. By establishing consistent practice across school from the earliest stage, we aim to support this consistent practice at home. 

Your child will start to bring books home when they are confident readers of sounds and words, relating to their reading stage. You will find they will bring home a phonics based book, this will aid application, speed and fluency - developing confident decoders for reading! Children should be able to read the RWInc home reading book independently and feel confident to apply their phonic knowledge to decode and read fluently.

 

Useful websites for Parents

Please find a list of websites that you may find useful in helping you and your child  learn about phonics. Games and fun activity websites are also included.

https://www.ruthmiskin.com/en/find-out-more/parents/ - Information and resources to support phonics learning at home

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks1/literacy/phonics/play/ - fun games for the children to play

http://www.ictgames.com/literacy.html  - fun games for the children to play

http://www.firstschoolyears.com/  - fun games for the children to play

BBC Bitesize - many games to play covering all areas of the curriculum

Paired Reading

Phonic Sessions

Interactive Read Write Inc Phonic Sessions

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Children work in small groups to develop their phonological knowledge. The sessions are interactive and engaging.

Interactive RWInc Phonic Session

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