Phonics Workshop

Phonics Workshop 26th September 2017

Phonics is … Phonics = + Knowledge of the Alphabetic code Skills of segmentation and blending

What is Letters and Sounds? • Letters & Sounds is a government phonics resource published in 2007. • Aims: • to build children’s speaking and listening skills • to develop their phonic knowledge and skills • It consists of six phases -> each phase building on the skills and knowledge of previous learning.

Phase 1 • There are 7 aspects: • A1 – Environmental • A2 – Instrumental sounds • A3 – Body Percussion • A4 – Rhythm and rhyme • A5 – Alliteration (words that begin with the same sound) • A6 – Voice sounds • A7 – Oral blending and segmenting.

Phase 2 • Set 1: s, a, t, p • Set 2: i, n, m, d • Set 3: g, o, c, k • Set 4: ck, e, u, r • Set 5: h, b, f, ff, l, ll, ss

How often do we teach phonics? • In Reception, phonics is taught every day for around twenty minutes • Lessons are fast paced, active, engaging and multi sensory • Approximately 2 sounds a week -> Sheets for each letter are in your pack. Please only practice the letters we have taught the children in school in order to re-enforce learning in letter formation and sound. • Lots of repetition and ‘over learning’ • Scheme is called: Jolly Phonics but we also follow the Primary National Strategy Letters and Sounds

How do we teach a new phoneme? • Show the children the picture and letter card of the phoneme. • When the children see the letter on the letter card, say the sentence e.g. ‘The letter name is S and the sound is ssss.’ and do the action for the letter. • When the children see the picture on the letter card, they say what they can se on the picture e.g. cat. • Decide if it is a bouncy or stretch sound. • “Robot talk” each word like c-a-t. • Count the number of phonemes on our fingers. • Sing the jolly phonics letter song. • Show the children what that phoneme looks like. • Children to come up with different words that have the phoneme in the word by e.g. looking at the IWB picture, signs around the classroom, etc. • Model how to hold our pencil. • Model how to write the phoneme. • Discuss what the letter looks like and practise forming the letter with our ‘pointing finger’. • Write 3 -4 CVC words including the new phoneme in precursive handwriting (remembering sound buttons!). • For example : • p o t . . . • Read a sentence/phrase including the new phoneme “ pat the dog.

Saying the sounds • Stretchy sounds: f l m n r s v z • Bouncy sounds: a i p u t h b d g o j c k ck e w x qu y • Your child will be taught how to pronounce the sounds (phonemes) correctly to make blending easier • Sounds should be sustained where possible (eg, sss, mmm, fff) • If not, ‘uh’ sounds after consonants should be reduced where possible (eg, try to avoid saying ‘b-uh’, ‘c-uh’)

Sound TalkBlending (Sounding out for reading) • Blending is recognising the letter sounds in a written word, and merging them in the order in which they are written to pronounce the word e.g. ‘c-u-p ->cup’. • Children need to be able to blend. It is a vital skill for reading.

Blending Building words from phonemes to read. c a t cat

Blending Qu ee n queen

Segmenting (Sounding out for Writing) • Segmenting is identifying the individual sounds in a spoken work (‘him’ h-i-m) and writing down letters for each sound to form the word. • Children need to be able to segment. It is a vital skill for spelling.

Segmenting • Breaking down words for spelling. cat c a t

Segmenting Queen qu ee n

Resources http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk

Phase 3 • Set 6: j, v, w, x • Set 7: y, z, zz, qu • Consonant digraphs: ch, sh, th, ng • Vowel digraphs: ai, ee, igh, oa, oo, ar, or, ur, ow, oi, ear, air, ure, er

Phase 4 • This phase consolidates all the children have learnt in the previous phases.

Phase 5 • Children will be taught new graphemes and alternative pronunciations for these graphemes. • Vowel digraphs: wh, ph, ay, ou, ie, ea, oy, ir, ue, aw, ew, oe, au • Split digraphs: a_e, e_e, i_e, o_e, u_e

Phase 6 • The focus is on learning spelling rules for suffixes. -s -es -ing -ed -er -est -y -en -ful -ly -ment -ness

Tricky words vs decodable words • Decodable words: Frequently used words in English language. Mostly phonetically plausible. For example: c – a – t • Tricky (High frequency) words : High frequency words which are not completely phonetically plausible. For example: the/no/to

Ideas for tricky words • Whilst out and about go ‘word spotting’ • Play guess the word – write a tricky word on child’s back with your finger • Play dominoes or pairs or snap or memory games with words • Count how many times you can find a particular word in a reading book – your child can read the word to you whenever it appears • Ask children to write the word with objects, i.e. toy cars, beads, stickers etc. • Use magnetic letters or letter cards, e.g. give children letters ‘t’, ‘h’, ‘e’, ‘i’ and ‘n’ – ask them to spell ‘the’ • Practise putting the word into context in a sentence verbally • Focus words for the week will be displayed downstairs • Practise often and for short bursts of time – not too many words at once

Reading • Aims: For the children to: • develop a love of books • know how books work • think about what they are reading

Ideas for reading • Before reading the book – Have your child look at the cover and predict what they think the story is going to be about – Have your child decide whether the book is a fairy tale/imaginary (fiction) book or a real (non-fiction) book – what lets us know this? – Point out the name of the book (title), the person who wrote the book (author) and the person who drew the pictures for the book (illustrator) – Ask your child to look for the blurb and read it to them – Do a picture walk through the book and let your child tell you what they think the book is about – Don’t look at the last page of the book, predict how the story might end

Ideas for reading • During the book – Ask your child questions about the characters in the book as you read the story – link to personal experiences – Have your child use his/her finger to follow the direction of the text (left to right, top to bottom) – Have your child look at the sentences and see if he/she can identify any of the sounds in the words or any of the tricky (high frequency) words they have learnt – Discuss any unusual words/ideas or features of the text – Encourage your child to join in with repeated refrains – Decide together on voices for the characters

Ideas for reading • After the book – Discuss with your child what they liked/disliked about the story and why – Did the story have a sad or happy ending? Can your child think of a different ending for the story? – Can they summarise what happened at the beginning, in the middle and at the end? – Can they recall key events from the story and find them in the book?

Reading – Our Reading Scheme • On Monday they bring home a teddy bear book for you to share with them. As a partnership we need to be encouraging a love of reading. • On Wednesday and Friday they bring home their reading book. • The children are encouraged to select their own book from within their colour band. • Books will be changed if you have initialed or left a comment in the reading diary. • At school we have daily reading sessions where we use big books and the children also read individually. Children can choose to read books independently in our book corner.

How to help your child read a word • Which letter phonemes do you recognise? Can you blend them together? • Does the word make sense? Read the sentence again to check. • Is there another word that would make sense? • Could the picture give you a clue? • Is it a word you know? • Have you read the word before? Is it on another page? • Are there any bits of the word you recognise? • Miss out the word, say ‘mmmm’, finish the sentence. Then go back and work out what the word was. • In a rhyming book, think of a word that rhymes. Always go back and read the sentence again!

Writing • We do lots of different activities at school to encourage mark making and develop children’s writing and phonic skills. • Painting letters with a brush. • Drawing letters in sand / water / foam / flour, sugar • Large chalk on chalk board. • Finger painting • Using arms and hands to write huge letters in the air. / drawing magic letters on each other’s backs.

Writing • Think about contexts that will motivate your child to write – they will want to feel their writing has a purpose • Let them watch you write for a variety of purposes – bring their attention to your role as a writer and think aloud • Think about scale and size… • Writing doesn’t need to involve paper and a pencil • Encourage your child to read their writing to you even if you find it unrecognisable • Any attempts at writing should be celebrated!

Making sentences • Ask them what they want to write. • Make it into a short, manageable sentence, e.g. “I went on the swings at the park.” • Say the sentence 2 or 3 times. • Count the words of the sentence on your fingers. • Act out capital letters, finger spaces and full stops whilst saying the sentence aloud • What was the first word? Do you know how to spell it? Write the first word. • Read the word they wrote. Say the whole sentence again counting the words. Which word do we have to write next? • Do you know how to spell that word? Stretch the word (say it slowly). What does it begin with? What else can you hear? • Write the letters that match the sounds they can hear in the word. • Read the sentence so far. What is the next word? • Keep repeating the above steps until they have finished the sentence. • Read the sentence back together

Developmental progression in Writing

Letter Formation • Fine motor skills • Gross motor skills • Pencil control and pencil grip • Cursive Script

Helping your child at home: • Phonics: • Use letter sounds • Pure sound, no “uh” on the end (example - sounding out “but”) • See sheets • Word Lists: • We send home lists of words for your child to learn. • Learning to recognize on sight tricky words is essential e.g. to, the, you, they. Frequent practice of tricky words until they are instantly recognizable is essential. Looking for them in books is good practice. • When they are confident please return to school and we will check and send home the next list. (We only send new lists once a week). • Writing: • Use the ‘Dress the sentence’ resources

Useful phonics resources • Phonics Play: www.phonicsplay.co.uk • CBeebies Alphablocks: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/alphablocks/ • BBC Words and Pictures: http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/wordsandpictures/ • Learn to read with Pip app • Reading eggs app • Twinkl: twinkl.co.uk (app also available) • Talking book apps – Cat in the Hat • Michael Rosen clips on youtube

Any Questions?

Phonics Workshop