Phonics

1. Phonics Foundation stage http://www.focusonphonics.co.uk/sound.htm

2. Phonics Year 1: Covers Phases 3-5 of Letters and Sounds Year 2: Covers Phase 6 of Letters and Sounds Letters and Sounds is the Department for Education and Skills publication which provides guidelines for the teaching of phonics.

3. Phonics – Year 1 Children entering Phase Three will know around 19 letters and be able to blend phonemes to read VC words and segment VC words to spell. While many children will be able to read and spell CVC words, they all should be able to blend and segment CVC words orally. The purpose of this phase is to teach another 25 graphemes, most of them comprising two letters (e.g. oa), so the children can represent each of about 42 phonemes by a grapheme Children also continue to practise CVC blending and segmentation in this phase and will apply their knowledge of blending and segmenting to reading and spelling simple two-syllable words and captions. They will learn letter names during this phase, learn to read some more tricky words and also begin to learn to spell some of these words. Children will then progress onto Phases 4 and 5 which consolidates learning and then teaches alternative spellings for sounds previously learnt.

4. Phase 5 • ay - day • oy - boy • wh - when • a_e - make • ou - out • ir - girl • ph - photo • e_e - these • ie - tie • ue - blue • ew - new • i_e - ike • ea - eat • aw - saw • oe - toe • au - Paul • o_e - home • u_e - rule Phonics Year 1 Phase 3 j v w x y z, zz qu ch - chip ar - farm sh - shop or - for th - thin/then ur – hurt ng - ring ow - cow ai - rain oi - coin ee - feet ear - dear igh - night air - fair oa - boat ure - sure oo - boot/look er – corner

5. Phonics Screening Children will take part in the National Phonics Screening at the end of Year 1. This is why children have got to be able to decode words using their phonic skills. The pass mark last year was 32/40

6. Phonics - Year 2 By the beginning of Phase Six, children should know most of the common grapheme– phoneme correspondences (GPCs). They should be able to read hundreds of words, doing this in three ways: reading the words automatically if they are very familiar; decoding them quickly and silently because their sounding and blending routine is now well established; decoding them aloud. Children’s spelling should be phonemically accurate, although it may still be a little unconventional at times. Spelling usually lags behind reading, as it is harder. During this phase, children become fluent readers and increasingly accurate spellers. Suffixes, pre-fixes, long words, knowledge of the spelling system and tenses are taught.

7. Guided Reading This is the specific teaching of reading and comprehension skills. Children read in dynamic ability groups. Every group reads once a week. There is a specific focus eg, language, text type, punctuation and blending. Children will read a wide range of challenging texts. Children really enjoy this! Children will usually complete a follow up activity to ensure understanding.

8. Home Reading As previously advised, you may be aware that your child is bringing home books that do not appear to be in a logical order, for example, one week a stage 3 book might be sent home while the following week, a stage 4 book is sent. This is because the books have now been organised into colour bands according to the difficulty of the text – these are shown by a coloured sticker on their spine. These books are for practice and consolidation; the guided reading books are used to teach, challenge and extend. Your child should be able to read these with relative ease and the focus should be on expression, fluency and comprehension. Children may therefore find it beneficial to read books several times. You will have received a set of suggested questions at the start of term and in some of the books there are also activities at the back. These are a good start in helping to ensure that your child develops skills that will enable them to become an efficient and fluent reader.

9. Home Reading - Expectations Home reading is homework. We value your partnership in developing your child’s reading; it’s a skill for life! Please sign your child’s reading record so that we are able to see that you have listened to your child read. This will also allow us to ask relevant questions to check their understanding. Unfortunately, the time constraints placed upon us due to an increasingly demanding curriculum do not allow for us to hear individual readers on a regular basis. To this end, we are also only able to change books once a week. Please feel free to extend your child by encouraging them to read other books that are available to you. Stroud has a very good library! Just make a note of anything else you read in their reading diary. You could also encourage your child to write about the characters from the story, draw pictures identifying where the story is set or write a book review.

10. Homework Reception: Reading at least twice a week. Phonics (sounds), high frequency words and tricky words given weekly for the children to practise daily. Year 1: Spellings given out on a Friday, tested the following Friday. Handwriting given on Friday, due in the following Thursday. Reading at least twice a week. Creative homework once a term Year 2: Spellings given out on a Friday, tested the following Thursday. Reading at least twice a week. Literacy/Numeracy given on a Friday and due in the following Monday (to begin after October half term.) Creative homework once a term. This has been set out in the class letter which you have already received. Homework is a statutory requirement and has been endorsed by our governing body.

11. Behaviour, rewards and sanctions. Golden Time: a time for choosing, rewarding good behaviour throughout the week and is linked to the class rules. Sanctions: children can lose Golden Time, in 5 minute increments. Children do have the chance to earn it back. This year, we will be keeping a weekly record of any time lost by your child and will be informing you at the end of each half term. Other sanctions may include: loss of playtimes, visits to other members of staff and going to see Mrs Wall. If your child is involved in a more serious incident, you will be informed at the end of the day.

12. I had all my Golden Time this term! Golden Time I missed___minutes of Golden Time this term. L

13. Behaviour, rewards and sanctions. Stickers: are used to instantly reward good behaviour or work Visits to others: Children are encouraged to show their good work to Mrs Wall and other members of staff. Certificates: Given in celebration assembly to praise particularly good examples of work. Star of the Week House points: Given to instantly reward positive behaviour and learning.

14. Year 2 Golden Time and Finishing Time. • Golden time and Finishing time are held on a Friday afternoon before Celebration Assembly. • Golden time is rewarding/sanctioning behaviour and this is separate to Finishing time. • Finishing time: children put any unfinished work during the week into a finishing tray. Before the children have their golden time they must first finish their work. This is necessary as the only other time they would be able to finish their work would be during breaktimes and lunchtimes. Also, it hopefully acts as an incentive to finish their work during the lesson as they are given differentiated work and have more than sufficient time to complete it in the lessons. • It has come to my attention that some of the children are confused between the two and are worrying about it. This is unfortunate and I will be taking the time to address their concerns and differentiate the purpose of the two. If this anxiety persists then action will be taken and information given to parents about what will replace Golden time and Finishing time during a Friday afternoon.

15. Numeracy Please see the hand-out that you received at the start of term. This should provide you with the objectives that the children should be able to achieve by the end of the year. It also gives you examples of activities to help your child achieve these objectives. A copy of the schools calculation policy is on the table for you to look at and we will also be sending a copy home soon. This will show you the methods that we use to teach each year group.

16. If you ever have any questions or worries about your child, we are always available at the end of the day for you to talk to.