Phonics

Phonics is an incredibly important tool for helping young children as they begin to learn to read and write. At Rivelin, Phonics learning starts in Nursery and continues all the way through to Year 2. Any children in KS2 who need further support with their reading and writing may also be part of Phonics groups within their classes.

At Rivelin, we follow the ‘Little Wandle’ phonics programme. This is used across all classes, ensuring consistency with how all Phonics lessons are taught and the resources which are used within them. This scheme is also matched to our home reading books, so all children from Reception onwards will be sent home with a reading book that is well-matched to their current Phonics ability.

Please help your child by practising their reading book daily at home, for 5-10 minutes. This time is so important to help children practise the Phonics skills they have learned in school and enable them to develop fluency within their reading.

Nursery

In Nursery, children begin to explore different sounds through stories and rhymes. More information about the specific activities that are done to help our Nursery children to develop can be found on the ‘Parents’ area of our website, using your log in details.

Reception

In Reception, children have whole class Phonics lessons daily. They are taught the sounds that are made by each of the letters of the alphabet, as well as some digraphs and trigraphs. Digraphs are two letters making one sound, e.g. sh, ch, ai and trigraphs are three letters making one sound, e.g. igh.

During Phonics lessons, children will be taught to recognise the sounds, as well as reading them within words and using them when writing words and sentences.

Alongside each of the Phonics sounds, children will also be taught how to recognise and read tricky words. These are words which cannot be sounded out using Phonics skills, so the children will need to practise them until they can read them by sight.

Children will be regularly assessed to monitor the progress that they are making with their Phonics learning and small group work will be done with those who require any extra input or support.

Please see the ‘Little Wandle Progression Grid’ below for the specific sounds and tricky words that the children will be taught at each point in the school year.

The videos below also show children saying each of the Phonics sounds that will be learned in Reception.

Year 1

In Year 1, children continue to be taught Phonics daily. They are taught alternative digraphs, where different pairs of letters can be used to make the same sounds, e.g. ai, ay, a and a_e.

They will continue to develop their reading and writing skills, applying these to the wider range of sounds they are now familiar with. They will also continue to develop the number of tricky words they can recognise and read.

Children will be regularly assessed to monitor the progress that they are making with their Phonics learning and small group work will be done with those who require any extra input or support.

Please see the ‘Little Wandle Progression Grid’ below for the specific sounds and tricky words that the children will be taught at each point in the school year.

Phonics Screening Check

In June of Year 1, all children will take the ‘Phonics Screening Check’. There will be 40 words for the children to read (with a known adult from school), all of which are designed to be read using their developing phonic knowledge. These words will be a mixture of real and nonsense ‘alien’ words. Throughout the year, children will have the opportunity to practise ‘alien’ words and will also have seen ‘Phonics Screening Checks’ from previous years with their teacher. This will ensure that they understand what they need to do and are confident with applying their Phonics knowledge to read both real and ‘alien’ words.

After the ‘Phonics Screening Check’ has taken place in Year 1, the pass mark will be announced. Any child who achieved over this mark will have passed. Any children who do not pass the ‘Phonics Screening Check’ in Year 1 will have the opportunity to try again when they are in Year 2. The results of your child’s ‘Phonics Screening Check’ will be sent out with their end-of-year report.

An example version of the ‘Phonics Screening Check’ can be found below. All ‘alien’ words are indicated by a small picture of an alien, so that children are aware that these words are not real.

Year 2

Within Year 2, children will continue to have daily Phonics lessons. They will further develop and consolidate their Phonics skills, for both the reading and writing of words. They will continue to practise alternative spellings of different sounds and will begin to use these more accurately as they develop a greater understanding of when each should be used.

The sounds which are taught within Year 2 will be determined by those which the children need to consolidate. Any children who did not successfully pass the ‘Phonics Screening Check’ in Year 1 will have the opportunity to try again when they are in Year 2.

If you are a parent/carer and would like to find out more about Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised, please follow this link for information on how you can support your child's educational journey in phonics and spelling.

https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/

For parents

The resources on this page will help you support your child with saying their sounds and writing their letters. There are also some useful videos so you can see how they are taught at school and feel…

www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk