Phonics learning starts in Nursery, with a strong focus on developing phonological awareness, communication, and language. Focusing on these areas gives children time to develop the listening skills they need to tune into sounds as they access more formal Phonics teaching through the Read Write Inc Phonics scheme, from Reception year.
RWI Phonics is in line with the Systematic Synthetic Phonics (SSP) teaching principles described in the ‘English programmes of study: key stages 1 and 2 – National curriculum in England’ (2014).
The RWI Phonics Programme supports children in learning how to read, spell and write in English, as well as supporting children who are learning to speak the English language as a new language.
The RWI Phonics programme teaches the letter/s-sound correspondences of the English alphabetic code explicitly and comprehensively for reading, spelling, and handwriting
The programme:
- is systematic and structured, with inbuilt revision to ensure the success of every child.
- has a rigorous teaching sequence, ensuring the phonics teaching & learning is straightforward, effective, and allows for differentiation in simple, but effective, ways.
- builds up knowledge of spelling word banks over time where words are spelt with the same letter/s-sound correspondences.
- is designed to inform parents/carers routinely and to work in partnership with them wherever possible.
- has an order of introducing the 44 sounds of the English language, which matches the order in ‘Letters and Sounds’ (DfES, 2007).
RWI Phonics lessons develop children’s reading fluency and language comprehension skills until they are ready to access whole class guided reading, usually at the end of Year 2.
Phonics Screening Check
Towards the end of Year 1, all children will sit a Phonics Screening Check. This is to check whether your child has made the expected progress in Phonics.
Your child will sit with a teacher he or she knows and be asked to read 40 words aloud. Your child may have read some of the words before, while others will be completely new. The check normally takes just a few minutes to complete and there is no time limit, if your child is struggling, the teacher will stop the check. The check is carefully designed not to be stressful for your child.
The check will contain a mix of real words and ‘non-words’ (or ‘nonsense words’). Your child will be told before the check that there will be non-words that he or she will not have seen before. Children will be familiar with these because we already use non-words in our Phonics teaching.
After the check, we will tell you about your child’s progress in Phonics and how he or she has done in the screening check. If your child found the check difficult, we will also talk to you about what support we have put in place to help them improve. Children who have not met the expected standard in Year 1, will retake the Phonics Screening Check in Year 2.
Helping Your Child with Phonics
Phonics works best when children are given plenty of encouragement and learn to enjoy reading and books. Parents play a very important part in helping with this.
Some simple steps to help your child learn to read through phonics:
- Ask your child’s class teacher about the school’s approach to phonics and how you can reinforce this at home. For example, the teacher will be able to tell you which letters and sounds the class is covering in lessons each week.
- You can then highlight these sounds when you read with your child. Teaching how sounds match with letters is likely to start with individual letters such as ‘s’, ‘a’ and ‘t’ and then will move on to two-letter sounds such as ‘ee’, ‘ch’ and ‘ck’. With all books, encourage your child to ‘sound out’ unfamiliar words and then blend the sounds together from left to right rather than looking at the pictures to guess. Once your child has read an unfamiliar word you can talk about what it means and help him or her to follow the story.
- Your child’s teacher will also be able to suggest books with the right level of phonics for your child. These books are often called ‘decodable readers’ because the story is written with words made up of the letters your child has learnt. Your child will be able to work out new words from their letters and sounds, rather than just guessing.
- Try to make time to read with your child every day. Grandparents and older brothers or sisters can help, too. Encourage your child to blend the sounds all the way through a word.
- Word games like ‘l-spy’ can also be an enjoyable way of teaching children about sounds and letters. You can also encourage your child to read words from your shopping list or road signs to practise phonics.
- Most schools use ‘book bags’ and a reading record, which is a great way for teachers and parents to communicate about what children have read. The reading record can tell you whether your child has enjoyed a particular book and shows problems or successes he or she has had, either at home or at school.