Phonics and Early Reading at Ogbourne C of E Primary
To support the teaching of phonics and early reading at Ogbourne C of E Primary School, we use the DfE validated systematic synthetic phonics programme Essential Letters and Sounds (ELS). The programme is written by the Knowledge Schools Trust in conjunction with Oxford University Press. The essence of the programme is consistency and simplicity and it aims to get children to read well, quickly.
We use a range of fully decodable reading books from Oxford University Press which are aligned with every stage of the phonics programme. Therefore, children are always reading material which is at their phonetic level.
Phonics and Early Reading at Ogbourne
Phonics
What is phonics and why do we teach it?
Phonics is a method of teaching beginners to read and pronounce words by learning to associate letters or letter groups with the sounds they represent. This is called ‘decoding’. Teaching phonics has been the principal method of teaching reading since the introduction of Letters and Sounds programme in 2007. Many studies have shown this is the most successful method of teaching children to read.
Children will be taught to associate the letter picture (grapheme) with the sound it makes (phoneme). Graphemes can be single letters, a string of two letters – digraph, three letters – trigraph or a longer string. Children will also be taught to recognise split-digraphs. (o-e, i-e, a-e, e- e u-e)
ELS Progression
ELS aims to get children to read well – quickly. There is a clear and quick progression from pre-school to end of KS1.
It follows the phases 2, 3 and 5 introduced by Letters and Sounds in 2007.
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Phase 1 – the critical pre-school years. This phase includes building knowledge of voice sounds, alliteration, rhyme and oral blending. The ability to recognise and use language in these ways is vital to reading success. These skills are strengthened by regular reading to your child at home, songs, nursery rhymes and all verbal interactions.
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Acorns Class- Phase 2 is started in the first weeks of school. By Christmas the Acorns will have been taught all phase 2 and phase 3 graphemes. In the spring terms Acorns will be reviewing phase 3 before learning longer CCVC and CVCC words. By the final term, Acorns will take a first look at the phase 5 graphemes. These will be reviewed in more depth in Oaks.
- Oaks children will begin the year by reviewing the previous phases before relearning phase 5 and going on to learn the many alternative spellings and pronunciations. Children will be prepared for the Phonics Screening Check in June.
How do we teach phonics?
Children will experience the same classroom routines within each lesson, which reduces cognitive load and maximising chances of success. This also ensures consistency in each class and in each lesson. In every single lesson, children will be reading.
In phonics lessons children will:
- review previously taught graphemes and Harder to read and spell words with flash cards.
- read single words and sentences
- write words using the spelling sequence before writing
- Write graphemes, words and sentences independently. Handwriting will be reinforced also.
- Read a decodable book or text with a partner
- Oral blend (c/oa/t)– sound talk words using robot arms and blending hands.
What are pure sounds and how do we pronounce them?
We must use pure sounds when pronouncing phonics and supporting children in reading words – this means no ‘uh’ after the sound. If we mispronounce these it will make reading harder for our children
Supporting children with reading and phonics at home
- There are few better ways to improve children’s chances in school and in the wider world than to support them to become independent readers. This should be a pleasurable activity!
- Reading is not just about decoding – it is about understanding language and story, knowledge of vocabulary and how sentences work. All of this gain through listening and speaking.
- Bedtime story – cosy up with a book!
How can I support my child with phonics? – Oxford Owl for Home
Reading books
Children will be bringing home two decodable books every week. These only contain the graphemes previously taught and are labelled ‘Read by myself’ books. We need children to practise these across the week at home.
Skills being practised:
- Decoding – sounding out
- Fluency
- Expression
- Comprehension
To foster a love of reading children will also bring home a book to ‘Read with someone’ each week. Children can select this book themselves from the class or school library. Please do share this book with your child to help build their vocabulary, knowledge of texts and comprehension.
We also offer families the means to access a range of 136 of the Oxford Owl e-library to expand the range of texts available for children and the means to access them on a screen.
Free eBook library – practise reading with phonics eBooks – Oxford Owl
Fluency
To read fluently we need children to have a strong orthographic map. This means that they learn sounds represented by letters or groups of letters in each word and can recognise them immediately. This is fluency. Without it there is no understanding or comprehension. For example, to consistently recognise that ea in bread spells e we need to read it at least four times for it to go into our long term memory.
Supporting writing
- We use the ELS spelling sequence to support writing.
- ELS introduces children to writing the letters and graphemes immediately.
- Correct pencil grip is taught and correct formation of the letters modelled using the mnemonics for each grapheme.
- In Acorns the children will print. If your children are writing at home please try to correct any pencil grip bad habits as this is nearly impossible to change even by Year 2.
- We will spend a large amount of time making sure children do this correctly as well as building muscle strength, fine motor skills and good posture habits through activities that may not involve a pencil at all!
- It is important that children read text using fonts they recognise. The Oxford books use a range of fonts which differ very slightly. Ones to watch are K and Q sometimes the font differs slightly.
- In Year 1 we introduce cursive script so children are ready to join or even joining by the end of Year 2 and into KS2. With a cursive script all letters start on the line with a lead in. We have found this helps the children know where to start with tall or short letters. They also produce the lead out – which leads naturally to fully cursive style.
Reading in Key Stage 2
At Ogbourne, we recognise that reading is a priority for all children. Strong reading skills have been shown to improve children’s academic attainment across a range of subjects, including English, maths and science as well as increase employment opportunities in the wider world.
Therefore, at Ogbourne, we aim to increase children’s reading fluency– their accuracy, automaticity and prosody (story teller voices). We believe greater fluency leads to better understanding.
The road to fluency begin in Acorns and Oaks where, through the daily phonics lessons, children practise their decoding skills. As children move up to KS2 they should have the skills to decode texts independently but will still need plenty of opportunity to practise fluency.
We have daily reading sessions in both Willows and Poplars to ensure that explicit teaching of reading, and fluency in particular does not stop at the end of KS1. These sessions are 30 minutes every morning and follow this pattern:
- 1x Extended read – all the children and teacher read a class text. This is a longer chapter book, usually fiction. Children have access to a copy of the book. Two thirds of this session will be spent reading, and one third will be oral work based on vocabulary and comprehension of the pages read.
- 1x close read – all the children and teacher read a shorter extract from a range of texts – fiction and non-fiction, poetry or song lyrics. One third of the session will be spent reading and two thirds will be spent answering questions about the text, with explicit vocabulary teaching forming part of the session.
- 2x fluency reads – in these sessions the children will be reading the extracts of text they have seen before and will practise reading these passages aloud. This paired reading is a continuation of what happens in Acorns and Oaks. Some children will work in a smaller group during these sessions where their reading will be guided by a teacher.
- 1 x Library Session – In this session children will have the opportunity to visit the library, gain reading recommendations from staff and peers and review books. It is also an opportunity for teachers to ensure that children are reading appropriate books, matched according to their level of phonics and fluency.
- Shared Reading – 10-15minutes each day is put aside after lunch for the teacher to read to the class. In KS2 two of these shorter afternoon sessions will also be opportunities for children to visit the library to exchange books when needed.
Through these reading sessions, our intent is to increase children’s engagement with their reading; to give them tasters of many different texts; to give them time to practise reading skills in school as well as at home; to give them the knowledge and confidence to select books independently and talk about their reading choices confidently. Enjoying reading is so important if children are to continue to be motivated to practise.
