Phonics
At Kelvin Grove Primary School, reading is at the heart of all that we do. Our aim is to encourage a love of books and for all children to leave our school as fluent and avid readers.
Our school has chosen Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised as our systematic, synthetic phonics (SSP) programme to teach early reading and spelling.
Some children learn to blend really quickly, and others take a little longer. If your child is finding it difficult, ask your child’s teacher for ways to help at home – playing blending games at home is so helpful!
Watch:
We usually teach four new sounds a week and have a review lesson on a Friday. You will get a list of the sounds that we are learning to have at home. This will help you with formation and pronunciation.
We will work our way through the whole Little Wandle Programme until your child can read fluently.
See the full Programme Overview Reception and Year 1 here
There are specific resources for the Little Wandle Programme which the children will be very familiar with. Each sound that we teach to begin with has either a mnemonic (like the astronaut that you can see here) or a phrase like boing-boing for ‘oi’. This helps the children recognise and remember the graphemes. Every time we teach a new sound, we also read words during the phonics lesson that contain that new sound so that the children practise what they have learned. We then go on to reading a sentence containing some of those words. We have displays in the classroom and on the tables to support the children throughout the day.
This is an example of what the children learn in Year 1.Children learn that there are graphemes that can have different sounds and sounds that can be made with different letters.
Use the backs and fronts of Phase 5 cards to show ‘ea’ and ‘ow’.
The children read the same book three times in a week. The first time we work on decoding (sounding out) the words, the second time we work on prosody which is reading with expression – making the book sound more interesting with our story-teller voice or our David Attenborough voice – and the third time we look at comprehension. We read the books three times at school because we want to develop the fluency. The more they see words the more they begin to read them automatically without having to sound them out.
We assess your child every six weeks to check progress. Any child who needs extra support has daily keep-up sessions planned for them.
The most important thing you can do is read with your child
Reading a book and chatting had a positive impact a year later on children’s ability to…
The amount of books children were exposed to by age 6 was a positive predictor of their reading ability two years later.
As well as the ‘learning to read’ book that your child will bring home they will also bring home a book for sharing with you. This book is SO important. This is how we are going to give them the WILL to read. Please read with your child as often as you can – at least once a day if possible.
The shared book is for YOU to read:
• Make the story sound as exciting as you can by changing your voice.
• Talk with your child as much as you can: oIntroduce new and exciting language oEncourage your child to use new vocabulary oMake up sentences together
oFind different words to use oDescribe things you see.
It is really important that you pronounce the sounds correctly at home if you are supporting your child. These videos are on the website for you to refer to and if you are unsure, please ask your child’s teacher.
https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/
Programme Overview Reception and Year 1
Pronunciation guide Reception Autumn 1
Pronunciation guide Reception Autumn 2
Practise and Play at Home
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/levels/z3g4d2p
A whole host of different subjects and things to discover.
