Phonics is a method of learning letter sounds, blending them together to read words and segmenting them to spell words.

It teaches the sound each letter or group of letters makes, rather than the letter name (which is also taught). This makes words easier to read and spell.

Our school follows the Read Write Inc. system which teaches the phonics in the following order:

Set 1 - Introduced in Reception

m  a  s  d  t  I  n  p  g  o  c  k  u  b  f  e  l  h  sh  r  j  v  y  w  th  z  ch  qu  x  ng  nk

Set 2 - Introduced in Reception

ay – May I play? 

igh – Fly high

oo – Poo at the zoo

ar – Start the car

air – That’s not fair!

ou – Shout it out

ee – What can you see?

ow – Blow the snow

oo – look at the book

or – Shut the door

ir – Whirl and twirl

oy – Toy for a boy

Set 3 Introduced in Year 1

ea – Cup of tea          

oi – Spoil the boy

a_e – Make a cake     

i_e – Nice smile

o_e – Phone home    

u_e – Huge brain

aw – Yawn at dawn   

are –Care and share

ur – Nurse with a purse

er – A better letter    

ow – Brown cow

ai – Snail in the rain   

oa – Goat in a boat

ew – Chew the stew  

ire – Fire, fire!

ear – hear with your ear

oe – woe my toe

ure – Sure it’s pure   

ie – tie your bowtie

ey – monkey bogeys

Additional Sounds:

ue – come to the rescue

au – Paul the astronaut

e-e – go to Pete and Steve!

kn – knock knock who’s there?

ck – tick tock clock 

wh – whisk whisk                            

ph – take a photo

ss ff ll zz

long vowel sounds  - a e i o u

For an audio guide to help with pronunciation of the sounds, you can search ‘Ruth Miskin phonics sounds’ on YouTube or follow this link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkXcabDUg7Q

Terms We Use With the Children

Fred Talk – Saying the sounds separately in a word before blending them together to read the word (Fred is a toy frog who can only talk in sounds e.g sh-o-p)

Special Friends – Letters that go together to make a new sound by forming digraphs (sh, ch, ai, oo) or trigraphs (igh)

Split digraphs – We say “Where’s my friend? He’s on the end!” to show, for example, that the digraph a-e is split but still works together making the word ‘cake’ or that i-e is making the word ‘like’

Bouncy sounds  - b c k d g h j p qu t w x y ch a e i o u

Stretchy sounds - f l m n r s v z sh th ng nk ay ee igh ow

Buttons and Swipes – these are used to help to read and write words by showing the single sounds with a button and a special friend with a swipe. See below for an example of what this looks like.

In the Summer Term of Year 1, there is a National Phonics Screening Test. More information can be found here:

https://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home/at-school/assessment-at-primary-school/phonics-screening-check/

Documents

Parent Phonics.pdf  A copy of the above information