Phonics and Early Reading
At TASS, we want all of our children to get the very best start in life & this includes learning to read! We want all of our children to enjoy it, be inspired by it & be able to do it brilliantly!
We’re very proud of our practice in early reading and follow the ‘Little Wandle Letters and Sounds’ Phonics scheme which is accredited by the DfE.
What is Phonics?
Phonics is a way of teaching children how to read and write and helps them hear, identify and use different sounds that distinguish one word from another in the English language.
Written language can be compared to a code, so knowing the sounds of individual letters and how the letters sound when they are combined helps children to decode words as they read. Understanding phonics also helps children know which letters to use when they are writing words.
Phonics involves matching the sounds of spoken English with individual letters or groups of letters.
For example, the sound k can be spelled as c, k, ck or ch.
Teaching children to blend the sounds of letters together helps them decode unfamiliar or unknown words by sounding them out. Similarly, children are taught to listen for the sounds making up words and to segment them for spelling.
For example, when a child is taught the sounds for the letters t, p, a and s, they can start to build up the words: “tap”, “taps”, “pat”, “pats” and “sat”.
Some words which are high in frequency but use less common phoneme-grapheme correspondences are taught to children as 'tricky words' or 'common exception words' to ensure that words such as said, was and of can be easily recognised and used.
The Curriculum:
Phonics is taught as a daily 30 minute lesson in Reception, Y1 & also going into Y2. Pupils who need additional support with their phonics in Key Stage Two also attend daily phonics sessions. Pupils are placed into a ‘phonics group’ based on the phase of phonics they are currently on.
Little Wandle Letters & Sounds:
Your child will learn the different sounds we have in the English Language. Please watch the videos on the site below to support your child with the correct pronunciation. To access the full site, please go to
https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/
Early Reading
Children begin to learn book handling skills and to participate in 'book talk' in their first term at school by reading wordless books. They will find pictures showing initial sounds of words (e.g. something that begins with 's'), and practice oral blending (such as finding a picture to match s-i-t). When they are ready to blend simple words by recognising the graphemes, saying the sounds they make and blending them into a word, they will begin to use decodable books which reinforce blending sounds to make words (such as in, at, sat, pin). Once they are decoding with confidence, they will move onto books with more than one word per page and their books will match their current phonics attainment as shown by the assessment information we regularly make for each child. Books are organised into phases to match the SSP programme and within each phase they may be several sets of books.
Reading is taught in small groups, with books carefully matched to individual needs. Children read a minimum of 3 times a week using the following structure:
Day 1 - Decode to practice blending the words in the book
Day 2 - Prosody to practice reading with greater automaticity and fluency
Day 3 - Comprehension to discuss the content of the book.
