Learning

to Read and Write

September 2013

Can you remember how you learnt to read?

Phonics Consists of:

Identifying sounds in spoken words Recognising the common spellings of each phoneme. Blending phonemes into words for reading. Segmenting words into phonemes for spelling.

How do we teach phonics in Reception?

At HSV we use a variety of different resources in order to teach phonics these include, The Jolly Phonics Programme a focused interactive published phonic programme The DCFS publication Letters and Sounds although not statutory, a recommended high quality phonics teaching programme which meets the core criteria.

Some Definitions
A Phoneme
How many phonemes can you hear in

This is the smallest unit of sound in a word

Remember you hear a phoneme

cat?

The 44 Phonemes
There are approximately 44 phonemes (sounds) in the English language. Note these sounds are NOT the letter names.

Consonant Phonemes b j p w th d k r wh ch f l s y sh g m t z zh h n v th ng

Vowel Phonemes a ae oo er e ee ar ow i ie ur oi o oe or air u ue au ear

These phonemes are often represented by several different graphemes (letter patterns)

A grapheme These are the letters that represent the phoneme. The grapheme could be 1 letter, 2 letters or more! We refer to these as sound buttons.

ai

igh

Remember you see a grapheme

Reception Phases
Phase 2 (Up to 6 weeks) Overview Working on: Using common consonants and vowels. Blending for reading and segmenting for spelling simple CVC (Consonant Vowel Consonant) words e.g. c-a-t. Working on: Knowing that words are constructed from phonemes (sounds) and that phonemes are represented by graphemes (written letters). Letter progression: Set 1: s, a, t, p Set 2: i, n, m, d Set 3: g, o, c, k Set 4: ck (clock), e, u, r Set 5: h, b, f, ff (huff), l, ll (full), Phase 3 (Up to 12 weeks): Overview Children working within this phase will be working on knowing one grapheme for each of the 44 phonemes Working on: Reading and spelling CVC words using letters and short vowels. Letter progression Set 6: j, v, w, x Set 7: y, z, zz (fizz), qu (quiz) Working on: Reading and spelling CVC words using a wider range of letters, short vowels, some consonant digraphs and double letters. Consonant digraphs (Sounds made up of 2 letters, the first being a consonant) ch (chip), sh (shop), th (that), ng (sing)

P1 phases
Working on: Reading and spelling a wide range of CVC words using all letters from phase 2 and less frequent consonant digraphs and some long vowel phonemes. Graphemes: ear (hear) , air (fair), ure (pure), er (hammer), ar (car), or (torn), ur (turn), ow (cow), oi (coin), ai (train), ee (sheep), igh (night), oa (boat), oo (boot/look) Phase 4 (4 to 6 weeks): Overview No new phonemes or graphemes are introduced in this phase. Children consolidate their knowledge of graphemes in reading and spelling words containing adjacent consonants (e.g. went: w-e-n-t) and polysyllabic words (words with more than one syllable). Working on: Blending adjacent consonants in words and applying this skill when reading unfamiliar texts. Working on: Segmenting adjacent consonants in words and apply this in spelling.

Graphemes
Starting point straight line down bhijkl mnprt uy Starting point horizontal straight line ez

Starting point curved acdfg oqs

Starting point: slanted line vwx

Some difficulties!

Graphemes similar

oa jt

dq bp

Writing graphemes
Different types of learners
Visual
Create an image

Visual Kinesthetic Auditory

Copy from a card Write on dry erase board

Kinesthetic

Write in sand, foam

Auditory

Teach song

Use rhyme

Fun Ideas
Fine motor skills are small movements of the hand and they are crucial to holding a pencil. If your child needs extra practice to strengthen fine motor skills, here are some activities you can try at home:

Cut out pictures from newspapers or magazines. Put together small beads and play with toys that teach building skills. Knead and build with dough or clay. Hide small objects in the dough and have your child find them. Play pegboard games. Play with any toys that involve manipulation of small pieces. Use a water bottle to squirt water on the sidewalk.

Have a cotton ball race across the table with your child. Finger-paint on a paper plate with sand or shaving cream. Use small marshmallows and toothpicks to form letters. String, popcorn, buttons, or beads to make necklaces. Use a hole-punch to create a design on a piece of paper. Clip clothespins to a container. Apply lace to cards. Gather small objects from around the house (small buttons, beads, etc.). Place them in a container, have your child pick them off the floor with a pair of tweezers, and place them back in the container.

Fun Ideas

Finding out moreUseful websites

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks1bitesize/literacy http://www.crickweb.co.uk

http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk http://www.ictgames.com/phonemePopLS_v2.html

Strategies we use to decode print

Children learn to read in many dierent ways, using many dierent strategies. Phonics-sounding out (blending) Picture cues Meaning-predicFng words through context Grammar-predicFng words using sentence structure

Phonics - Blending
44 phonemes in English language Once children know the rst four sounds: s-a-t-p they will also start learning to blend these sounds together to make words like; sat, at, pat, as How can you pracFce blending? (Metal Mike, Find the picture, Robot talk, Simon says) Phonemes are put together to construct simple words BUT NOT ALL! 65% of all words are phoneFcally irregular. These phoneFcally irregular words are called Tricky Words. They need to be visually remembered. E.g through bingo or memory games

Using Phonics to support reading

What sound does the word begin with? Can you sound these le`ers together? (eg cat c-a-t = cat) Robot speak! Are there any parts/chunks of the word you can read? (eg fan-tas-Fc) What sound do these le`ers together make? (sh igh ph)

Picture cues

Meaning
Condence in spoken language enables a reader to predict text through their own knowledge and experience. Understanding the text at every stage allows a reader to make an informed guess at an unknown word. Having prior knowledge about the subject or story allows children to decode AND understand new vocabulary

Warming up the Text

Discuss the Ftle Discuss the pictures of the whole book Ask children to point out anything interesFng in the pictures and talk about what might be happening at that point in the story What do you think is going to happen in the story? Has this ever happened to you? What do you already know about..? Introduce new or dicult vocabulary before you start reading NOW the child is ready to read

Grammar

We can predict whether a word ts in a sentence simply by using our knowledge of spoken language.

Ask quesFons like: Does that sound right? Does the sentence make sense? What word could you t in there so that the sentence will make sense?

For example: Child reads: I went to the shop and I boring an apple - This does not sound right because it is the wrong type of word to be in that posiFon within a sentence

Helping your child to read at home

Always warm up the text Help your child to use the dierent reading strategies: phonic knowledge, meaning, grammar and visual cues. NEVER do anything for a child that they can do themselves.

And simply ENJOY reading together!!!!