Phonics for parents Mrs Tighe Successful reading demands

Phonics for parents Mrs Tighe

Successful reading demands both word level reading and the ability to comprehend what has been read.

+ Word recognition - + Language comprehension

Word Recognition Good language comprehension, poor word recognition + Good word recognition, good language comprehension - + Poor word recognition, poor language comprehension Good word recognition, poor language comprehension Language comprehension

Enunciation • When working with your child on a phonics activity, it is essential that both of you enunciate the sounds correctly. • Phonemes should be articulated clearly and precisely.

Letters and Sounds • DVD clip – enunciation

Phonic terminology: some definitions

Some definitions A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound in a word. C-u-p c-a-t d-o-g

Count the phonemes • How many phonemes (units of sound) can you count in the following words? • • Bus Ship Bend Round

Some definitions Grapheme Letter(s) representing a phoneme t ai igh

Some definitions Blending Recognising the letter sounds in a written word, for example c-u-p, and merging or synthesising them in the order in which they are written to pronounce the word ‘cup’.

Some definitions Oral blending Hearing a series of spoken sounds and merging them together to make a spoken word – no text is used. For example, when a teacher calls out ‘b-u-s’, the children say ‘bus’. This skill is usually taught before blending and reading printed words.

Some definitions Segmenting Identifying the individual sounds in a spoken word (e. g. h-i-m) and writing down or manipulating letters for each sound to form the word ‘him’.

Some definitions Digraph Two letters, which make one sound A consonant digraph contains two consonants sh ck th ll A vowel digraph contains at least one vowel ai ee ar oy

Some definitions Trigraph Three letters, which make one sound igh dge

Some definitions Split digraph A digraph in which the two letters are not adjacent (e. g. make).

CVC Words • C consonant phoneme • V vowel phoneme • C consonant phoneme

Consonant digraphs ll ss ff zz hill puff fizz sh ship ch th wh chat thin ck ng qu x fox sing quick

A segmenting activity s s l l i i p p

Segmenting WORD PHONEMES shelf sh e l f dress d r e ss think th i n k string s t r i ng sprint s p r i n flick f l i ck t

A basic principle The same phoneme can be represented in more than one way: burn first term heard work

Sorting activity • • Field Moon Room Meal Mine Bus Snake

in more than one way a e i o u oo ow oi ar or air eer a-e e-e i-e o-e u oy a aw ear ai ea ie oa ue oul ou ay ee igh oe oo ore a ear ey y y ow ew ough eigh

Spelling • There are patterns that help to narrow possibilities – for example for each vowel phoneme some digraphs and trigraphs are more frequently used before certain consonants than others. • Children need to explore these patterns through word investigations. • This can be discussed while reading at home or discussing the spelling pattern in their key words

Spelling – using sound buttons • Placing a dot underneath each grapheme helps children to segment and blend difficult words, both for reading and spelling

High frequency words • The majority of high frequency words are phonically regular. • Some exceptions – for example the and was – are directly taught and called ‘tricky words’.

Games to play at home • The sorting activities above • There are lots of videos and websites to support phonics at home, including: Mr Thorne does phonics Jolly phonics BBC bitesize Phonicsplay. com Letters-and-sounds. com Ictgames. com Pirate phonics (ipad game)

Key word games • • Key word bingo Memory Snap Hide the key words around the house and have a treasure hunt