Phonics
The importance of early reading, our approach to teaching phonics
At Buglawton, phonics is taught through the systematic acquisition of sounds using the synthetic phonics programme FFT Success for All Phonics.
FFT Success for All Phonics programme is a complete Systematic Synthetic Phonics (SSP) programme validated by the DfE. Success for All Phonics provides 68 fully decodable reading books (Shared Readers), daily phonics and reading lesson plans, assessment tools, picture cards, mnemonics for letter formation and all other teaching resources needed to support the effective teaching of phonics from EYFS to the end of Year 1.
The programme is designed for daily use from the beginning of Preschool, enabling children to make a smooth transition from the EYFS to Key Stage 1. The daily lesson plans cover all the main Grapheme–Phoneme Correspondences (GPCs) and Common Exception Words (CEWs) to provide children with the phonic knowledge and skills required for success in the Year 1 Phonics Screening Check.
In Year 2, children use Spelling with the Jungle Club's online platform to access engagingdaily spelling lessons. Via our 'Routes to Reading', children in Year 2 continue their reading journey from Year 1 by developing reading fluency, comprehension and vocabulary, via a wide range of specially written, engaging texts.
The 'Phonics Screening Check' is taken individually by all children in Year 1 and is designed to give feedback to teachers and parents on how each child is progressing in Phonics. Pupils are asked to read 20 real words and 20 pseudo words, known to the children as 'alien words', in order to ensure children are decoding the words instead of memorising or guessing. ‘Alien words’ are introduced to children in Reception.
During early reading children should become confident readers, having the ability to:
decode a word
comprehend the meaning of each word they read
Both of these are needed in order to make sufficient progress in reading.
All children have explicit phonics lessons throughout their first four years at school, starting from Preschool in order to ensure they have enough time to become secure with their decoding skills. Our reading scheme supports phonics teaching.
Helpful links:
How to correctly pronounce the grapheme-phoneme-correspondence:
https://vimeo.com/showcase/9340990
FFT Parent Portal (full of lots of tips of how to support your child at home!)
