Phonics/Reading
English at St Anne’s
At St Anne’s CE Primary School, we strive to meet the needs of all pupils with a broad and balanced curriculum in English. In our school, we offer pupils a high-quality English education where all children have the opportunity develop a rich and varied vocabulary; the confidence and ability to have well-structured discussions; the passion and skills to be life-long readers and to communicate with control, skill and voice as authors of their own writing. Through inspirational delivery of the English curriculum, we foster independence and focus on developing resilient learners.
Our curriculum is designed so that all pupils are exposed to a diverse and rich variety of texts and authors so that all pupils have the opportunity to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. Our children have regular opportunities to read and listen to others. This requires courage and a continuing culture of respect. From EYFS to KS2, we provide nurturing opportunities to guide and inspire children so that they are volitional readers with a passion for reading for pleasure and information.
In Writing, our children are provided with a high-quality, exciting curriculum. This curriculum teaches them to not only write fluently, but to write at length, for a range of purposes. English topics are skilfully planned so that they link with wider areas of the curriculum to contextualise learning and add purpose. We focus on developing resilient learners, who have the courage, to be explorative with their writing and learners that can confidently plan, revise and evaluate their writing, ensuring cohesion for the reader. Children are consistently taught spelling patterns and rules to enable confident and dynamic spellers. Through our teaching of spelling, children can accurately apply the relationship between letters and sounds (phonics), understanding of morphology (word structure) and orthography (spelling structure). We have consistently high expectations of handwriting and presentation which enables children to be proud of the work that they produce and showcase fluent, legible and joined writing.
By the end of Key Stage 2, and in preparation for Key Stages 3 and 4, our curriculum for English aims to ensure that all pupils:
- Read easily, fluently and with good understanding
- develop the habit of reading widely and often, for both pleasure and information
- acquire a wide vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and knowledge of linguistic conventions for reading, writing and spoken language
- appreciate our rich and varied literary heritage
- write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences
- use discussion in order to learn; they should be able to elaborate and explain clearly their understanding and ideas
- are competent in the arts of speaking and listening, making formal presentations, demonstrating to others and participating in debate
We believe that through these opportunities and the delivery of our rich English curriculum, we prepare children for an ever-changing world. Our children become confident communicators and their dynamic skills will continue to shine throughout their lives.
Phonics (EYFS and KS1)
What is Phonics and why is it so important?
Phonics is recommended as the first strategy that children should be taught in helping them learn to read. It runs alongside other teaching methods such as Guided Reading and Shared Reading to help children develop all the other vital reading skills and hopefully give them a real love of reading.
At St. Anne’s, we use the Read Write Inc (RWI) scheme as the core of our teaching strategy for learning sounds in Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1.
Children who read or are read to regularly have 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 read 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
We have put together a guide to how the RWI programme works together with some useful links.
Mrs Withey is our Read Write Inc lead teacher, so if you have questions about RWI, contact school who can refer you to her. Please take the time to read the information as it will provide invaluable information as to how you can help and support your child in reading.
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. At St. Anne’s we primarily use the sounds elemnt of the programme but will supplement guided reading with the fiction and non-fiction books when appropriate. We begin the programme in Reception and will continue teaching RWI to children beyond the age of 7 if they still need support in their reading.
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 teacher so they work with children at the same level. This allows complete participation in lessons.
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
Children will be taught how to read as follows:
- Before you start to teach your child, practise saying the sounds below.These are the sounds we use to speak in English.
- 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 following video is an example of blending sounds with Fred.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEzfpod5w_Q
The children are taught the sounds in 3 sets.
- Step 1:
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.
| 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 thehooves 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 |
Please do not use letter names at this early stage.
- Children will also use pictures for each sound to help recognise the sound and then form the shape of the sound.
Step 2:
- 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? |
- 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. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yM87ZNIkBm0 for further information on the Screening check.
Step 3:
Children will be introduced to ‘Ditty books’ in Reception when they successfully begin to read single words. The short vowels should be kept short and sharp:
Children use sound-blending (Fred Talk) to read short ditties. Children will then be challenged to use their developing phonic knowledge to write short sentences.
Within all the books children will have red and green words to learn to help them to become speedy readers. Red words are words that are not easily decodable and challenge words to extend children’s vocabulary. Green words are linked to the sounds they have been learning and are easily decodable.
Phonics Screening Check Year One
What is the Year 1 phonics screening check?
The Year 1 phonics screening check is a short assessment in June to confirm whether individual pupils have learnt phonic decoding to an appropriate standard.
It will identify the children who need extra help so they are given support by their school to improve their reading skills. They will then be able to retake the check so that schools can track pupils until they are able to decode.
Guided Reading Map Year 2 Guided Reading Map Year 3 Guided Reading Map Year 4 Guided Reading Map Year 5 Guided Reading Map Year 6 Progression of Knowledge and Skills