The Teaching of Phonics

At Forestdale Primary School the teaching of phonics and reading is a high priority and children begin their learning as soon as they arrive from Early Years. We believe reading is the most important skill and phonics is the foundation for this in order to ensure that children can read fluently, accurately and have the ability to understand the text they have read.  

The school follows the government published programme Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised (2021) SSP. We follow their progression, planning and teaching delivery and methods to ensure our children learn to read as quickly as reasonably possible. This in turn means that children can then use their reading skills to support the rest of their learning.

Foundations for Phonics in Nursery

We provide a balance of child-led and adult-led experiences for all children that meet the curriculum expectations for ‘Communication and language’ and ‘Literacy’. These include:

• sharing high-quality stories and poems
• learning a range of nursery rhymes and action rhymes
• activities that develop focused listening and attention, including oral blending
• attention to high-quality language.

• We ensure Nursery children are well prepared to begin learning grapheme-phoneme correspondences (GPCs) and blending in Reception.

Little Wandle Foundations is aligned to the non-statutory guidance on Development Matters and Birth to 5 Matters as well as the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) statutory framework

Language and Nursery rhymes in Reception

• Research tells us that nursery rhymes can support children to develop their language, their awareness of sounds within words and even their later reading. 
• We use the Little Wandle Rhyme time videos and accompanying phonological awareness planning to complement and reinforce our Phase 2 teaching.

Phonics lessons in Reception and Year 1

Reception and Year 1 children take part in daily phonic lessons which lasts 30 minutes. In Reception, we build from 10-minute lessons, with additional daily oral blending games, to the full-length lesson as quickly as possible. Each Friday, we review the week’s teaching to help children become fluent readers. Lessons are well paced, highly engaging and require all children to be active participants in their learning. Our expectations of progression are aspirational yet achievable; children who are not keeping up with their peers are given additional practise immediately through keep-up sessions.

Daily phonics and spelling in Year 2

Year 2 begins by using assessment to ensure that children have completed the Little Wandle Year 1 progression. Any gaps in teaching are addressed through daily phonics lessons until the programme is completed. Corresponding summative assessments are carried out to ensure this content is secure. Once all Year 1 content has been taught and assessed, we teach a five-week Phase 5 review. This ensures that children secure the trickier elements of Phase 5 and can apply this alphabetic knowledge in both reading and spelling. Once the Phase 5 review is secure, we teach the Bridge to spelling before moving to the Spelling units.

Reading in school and at home

Children enjoy a range of multi-sensory resources to support their phonics learning. On-going assessment of children's progress takes place half termly and the books children read in school and take home to read are fully decodable and matched to children's secure phonics knowledge. As well as receiving two fully decodable books, children take home two non-decodable book for sharing that can be either read to or with them. These books play an essential role in developing a love of reading; an important distinction is that these books are being shared with the children. 

Phonics Screening Check

The National Phonics Screening Check is performed in June of Year 1. The purpose of the screening check is to confirm that all children have learned phonic decoding to an age-appropriate standard. The children who did not meet the required standard for the check in year 1 enter again in year 2 with additional support.

Useful websites to help with your child's phonics