16/02/18
What is Phonics?
A parent and pupil guide
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You may have heard a lot of talk about phonics in recent years. Depending on how you were taught to read, you’re probably either totally perplexed as to what phonics are, or surprised to learn that this isn’t the only way to learn how to read. Below we lay out exactly what this method of teaching entails, why it’s become an educational buzzword and how you can best support your child on their phonics journey.
Policy
Phonics is a method of teaching children to read by correlating sounds with symbols in an alphabetic writing system. It is primarily taught at Key Stage 1 and 2. Recently, phonics is coming up more frequently in discussion. This is mainly due to the introduction of a Year 1 phonics screening test for children in 2012. This was introduced to ensure schools across the country are adopting this method of teaching as opposed to ‘look and see’ where children are taught to look at and recognise the word as a whole (a method employed by the Janet and John books popular in the 50’s and 60’s which were revived in 2001).
Now if you’re worried about your six year-old having to undergo hours of testing at such a tender age, fear not. The test is described as a ‘light-touch’ assessment and is carried out and marked internally by your child’s teacher. The whole thing only takes five-ten minutes (see here for allegations of result rigging).
Your child would be deemed of the expected standard if they achieve 32 out of 40 on the test, which comprises of them phonetically sounding out and then saying 20 made up and 20 real words. This video may be of use to see exactly how children are tested and what constitutes a pass.
Phonemes and Graphemes
The teaching of phonics relies on the relationship between phonemes and graphemes. Put more simply, phonemes are the sounds that make up a language (approximately 44 in English) while graphemes are the combinations of letters that make these sounds (there are 144 such combinations of the 26 letters in the alphabet – as we all know there are certain sounds that can be written in different ways).
| Phoneme (sound) | Grapheme (written) | Examples |
| /b/ | b, bb | ball, lobby |
| /ch/ | ch, tch | chat, watch |
| /d/ | d, dd, ed | duck, shudder, mixed |
| /f/ | f, ph | flip, phone |
| /g/ | g, gg | google, egg |
| /h/ | h | hat |
| /j/ | j, g, ge, dge | jam, gem, sage, hedge, |
| /k/ | c, k, ck, ch, cc, que | cat, kite, peck, school, soccer, cheque |
| /l/ | l, ll | lab, ball |
| /m/ | m, mm, mb | man, summer, thumb |
| /n/ | n, nn, kn, gn | not, fennel, knot, gnome |
| /ng/ | ng, n | thing, pink |
| /p/ | p, pp | pen, apple |
| /r/ | r, rr, wr | run, berry, wrong |
| /s/ | s, se, ss, c, ce, sc | sun, house, missing, cell mice scene |
| /sh/ | sh, ss, ch, ti, ci | shut, Russian, machine, station, special |
| /t/ | t, tt, ed | tap, better, coped |
| /th/ (unvoiced) | th | thongs |
| /th/ (voiced) | th | feather |
| /v/ | v, ve | vase, have |
| /w/ | w | won |
| /y/ | y, i | yes, onion |
| /z/ | z, zz, ze, s, se, x | zulu, buzz, freeze, is, cheese, xylophone |
| /zh/ | ge, s | marriage, measure |
| /a/ | a | bat, |
| /ā/ | a, a_e, ay, ai, ey, ei | baby, make, ray, rain, hey, rein |
| /e/ | e, ea | bet, thread |
| /ē/ | e, e_e, ea, ee, ey, ie, y | be, these, plead, bee, key, brief, rainy |
| /i/ | i | sit |
| /ī/ | i, i_e, igh, y, ie | blind, rice, sight, sky, die |
| /o/ | o, a, au, aw, ough | body, want, taunt, saw, thought |
| /ō/ | o, o_e, oa, ow | no, bone, float, flow |
| /oo/ | oo, u, oul | took, put, should |
| /ōō/ | oo, u, u_e | soon, Ruth, tune |
| /ow/ | ow, ou, ou_e | bow, out, house |
| /oy/ | oi, oy | coin, boy |
| /u/ | u, o | fun, son |
| /ū/ | u, u_e, ew | uniform, fuse, pew |
| /a(r)/ | ar | bar |
| /ā(r)/ | air, ear are | fair, bear, bare |
| /i(r)/ | irr, ere, eer | stirrup, here, beer |
| /o(r)/ | or, ore, oor | or, more, floor |
| /u(r)/ | ur, ir, er, ear, or, ar | churn, fir, per, learn, work, molar |
Made up words
As with everything in education policy, the jury is out as to whether including made up words in the test is a good thing. The reasoning for their inclusion is to check the children have correctly gained the skill of being able to sound out and construct (or blend) a word from its individual sounds, as opposed to simply recognising the word as a whole. This is a useful skill when they come to encounter new, longer, unheard of words in the future. While naysayers believe that these made up words may confuse young learners, they are always accompanied by a picture of a fantasy creature, so will be likely to imagine that this is the name of the creature. Dr Seuss would certainly be proud.
Teaching phonics
Obviously the mention of a test is likely to send parents into a panic, but it’s essential to remember that we are talking about six year olds here… they should definitely not be cramming for tests at this age.
The most important thing is to ensure that learning is fun. It’s well known that at Manning’s Tutors we believe a child who enjoys learning will gain far more than one who finds it a chore.
As a parent, the best approach is to incorporate a little phonics learning into daily life…
- When walking or driving to school, ask them to sound out road signs on the way
- Make letters multisensory. Letter-blocks, fridge magnets, alphabet spaghetti or homemade ransom notes are great opportunities to practice sounding out letters, or combining them to real or made-up words
- Interactive games can be found at phonicsplay for the tablet loving child
- Or you can get outside and play letter hopscotch
- Play I-spy, but use phonics sounds “I spy something containing /a/”
Lastly, we’d recommend not to become too focussed on phonics at the behest of all else. You can and should of course still read for fun with your child!
If you’d like to have a chat with us about phonics and how we could help your child progress in school then just get in touch with one of the team here.