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I'm not sure that I am impressed with new schools approach to reading (reception) should i worry or am i being pfb?

26 replies

littleducks · 12/10/2010 17:33

We moved and dd started at a school i would not have chosen (too far and good ofsted versus outstanding) on paper but that seems ok on visiting. She seems gto enjoy it, although is struggling to make friends atm.

DD previously was in preschool, she knows her full alphabet and the initial two letter combos (sh/ch/ng/oo/ee etc) and has a vague idea about 'magic e' words. She is familiar with some 'tricky words' (the/i/said) and can read this from memory.

Her preschool followed the ruth miskin, read write inc programme and was very keen on phonics being a code children could use to break down stories to learn to read.

I attended reading info session and am a bit surprised and disapoined with new primary school. They said that they encourage learning stories by repeated reading and we should encourage children to guess words in reading books based on context.

This seems like a big no, no to me. I know dd can learn stories off by heart (we can do bear hunt etc with no books) but i dont want her to start guessing words rather than bothering to try to decode them.

The school wants to concentrate on teaching children letters now, based in kinaesthetic groups: this is c, this is a, which is a c with joins then flicks, this is q same as c but with a tail etc. And for us to read to children and encourage them to pretend to read by memorising stories/guessing words they dont know by context.

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nemofish · 12/10/2010 17:49

We all guess words in context when we start learning to read, it is a valuable skill.

My dsd cannot do this at all. She had to 'guess' the spelling of the word 'treacle' and came up with 'tricoll.' She's 13...

Context helps all of us, perhaps to decode a word that we have heard, perhaps used ourselves but not seen in a written form. It is also a vital skill in comprehension. I wouldn't worry. The most important thing I think to make good use of your local library, if you have them, let your children see you enjoying reading and help them develop a love of reading for pleasure and writing as self expression.

Not so sure about the memorising thing, but, again, we all do this. You don't have to struggle, letter by letter, word by word through everything I have typed here, because you have memorised thousands, or hundreds of thousands, of words. You will be 'skimming' most likely, looking quickly to see what letters a particular word contains, and 'guessing' the word based on context, but you don't know you're doing it.

Again my poor dsd was let down hugely by her mother school and is largely unable to do this. She reads laboriously, has poor comprehension and cannot 'skim' at all. She struggles to find which bottle in the bathroom is the shampoo, I say read the labels, and she starts with the very first word... 'Loreal clear skin wisdom wash, contains coconut extract and...' instead of just searching and skimming for the one word, 'shampoo.'

Whatever you and I might think of methods, the fact is that the teachers / school are people trained to educate others and may know a bit more than the average parent in the street. If anyone comes up with a fool proof super easy way to teach children to read, rest assured they will market if for millions.

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Feenie · 12/10/2010 17:58

Atrocious method and not at all recommended practice - even the worst schools at least use mixed methods (whole word/phonics). A child taught purely using sight words is very likely to struggle eventually, as this method alone can only take some children so far.

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lovecheese · 12/10/2010 18:02

Feenie I would agree.

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nemofish · 12/10/2010 18:12

Bugger.

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ColdComfortFarm · 12/10/2010 18:19

I would be extremely worried about a school which has deliberately rejected the best and most effective way to teach children to read in favour of one that studies show is NOT effective. I would talk to the head and hope you have got the wrong end of the stick, but if they really don't teach phonics I would find a better school. It is MAD to choose a far less effective method when we are talking about something as serious as this.

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TootAndCommon · 12/10/2010 18:19

It sounds as if the school is teaching the preparation for phonics, by teaching the letters etc, and encouraging looking at books, sharing, giving the idea of reading. Your dd is beyond this stage, but others may not be. Even if children learn to read through phonics, there will be an element of word recognition. The school may well move on to phonics next.

Talk to the teacher and find out what the plan is.

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ColdComfortFarm · 12/10/2010 18:21

Phonics should be the very start of reading in reception.

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littleducks · 12/10/2010 18:22

The school do claim to use phonics but seem to not really understand them, the literacy co ordinator who gave the talk had some ORT songbirds books but she complained that they were too phonic and were difficult for the children as the words didnt really match the pictures and were difficult to guess.

I was inwardly screaming at this as the books had been specially developed and designed as such to stop children guessing.

I'm not saying dd should never consider context, but i worry that if children become reliant on repetitive texts with picture clues they will then not be able to read when they move onto 'real books' with fewer/no pictures.

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ColdComfortFarm · 12/10/2010 18:23

You are right littleducks. Guessing is not reading!

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littleducks · 12/10/2010 18:24

DD will be assigned her first reading book this week, so i will be waiting until after then to see how she is catered for before complaining.

I have also volunteered to go in and listen to children read after half term.

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littleducks · 12/10/2010 18:26

I have just talked to my mum on the phone who says this was exactly the conversation she had 20 or so years ago when i was in nursery and first learning to read.

Well the literacy coordinator did say she had been doing the job 20 plus years

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ColdComfortFarm · 12/10/2010 18:26

It is such a shame for the children who don't have involved parents when schools screw up the teaching of reading. Guessing and memorising looks impressive at first, but as another poster said, these skills soon fade as text becomes more complex and picture clues disappear, and then children are years behind.

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nemofish · 12/10/2010 19:38

Funny really. I wasn't taught via phonics, and in fact while studying at college some tutors were of the opinion that they could always tell when a student had learnt to read via phonics, because they couldn't spell. Enuff sed.

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seeker · 12/10/2010 19:42

There are those who say that phonics teaches decoding but not reading - and word recognition teaches comprehension.

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mrz · 12/10/2010 19:45

I think decoding is the first stage to becoming a reader but not the whole picture. Obviously understanding and inference are later skills but guessing isn't an effective reading strategy at any stage

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mrz · 12/10/2010 19:47

and funnily enough my spelling improved when I learnt phonics as an adult at university

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grandpainmypocket · 12/10/2010 19:50

But seeker surely what happens is a child decodes new words initially but then learns them by sight so that's when the comprehension side of things kicks in.

Initially reading the cat sat on the mat with decoding might ruin the flow but eventually they'd just recognise it and then be able to concentrate more on understanding?

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seeker · 12/10/2010 20:03

I'm not an expert - or a fan of any particular system. I just know that there are people who feel strongly that synthetic phonics is (are?) not the best way into reading, even thought it s demostrably the best way into decoding.

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cazzybabs · 12/10/2010 20:10

they haven't said they aren't doing phonics have they - would be surprised if they aren't and have a glowing OFSTED

Reading and memorizing stories is good practise because the children learn the language of stories which feeds into writing

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missmapp · 12/10/2010 20:16

Ds1 ( in year 1) has been taught the phonics method ( letters and sounds) but until recently, was only really 'learning' words and getting through the books because of his knowledge of how books work ( if he saw a I followed by an ! on the last page he would automatically read Oh No! said Floppy!) Although he has got by with this method, I am really pleased he has now used his phonics to breakdown words. I would say that memory alone is not enough, just try reading a foreign language and you know it is decoding you rely on. As previously said, it is a mix of methods that seem to work best

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Feenie · 12/10/2010 20:29

Can I just correct a misunderstanding here? Teaching using a phonics only method definitely does not mean teaching reading without understanding - whatever method is used, teachers ensure they teach comprehension aswell.

Teaching using mixed methods means teaching using phonics and whole word/sight reading. It's confusing for some children.

But no one would ever advocate the teaching of reading without teaching understanding alongside.

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roadkillbunny · 12/10/2010 20:39

My dd (now Y1) has speech problems that make using phonic sounds and blending quite hard for her (sounds don't come out as they should so the word doesn't make sense). Last year in reception her teacher explained to me that dd was guessing and relying on whole word recognition to much because it was easier for her and while at that moment it was seeing her okay there was only so far she could go with that before hitting a plateau with her reading (it was already starting to show 'reading' brush when the word was mop etc), I could see it myself even though I am learning phonics right along with dd, they put dd only songbirds and Floppys phonics, pulling her back to the simple blending and building her confidence (that was shattered at that point, she had a tough reception year) with the much more simple books.

The pressure was off and dd has made massive improvements, everybody is very pleased with her progress now, she is still technically behind with her reading but the approach seems to be working and she is back on the standard ORT books now and doing well, using her phonics when she comes across a new word.

The way you describe the teaching in your school seems to be the opposite of what we were told and have seen work well with a struggling child, I would defiantly be worried in your shoes and I am normally of the 'have you nothing better to worry about' school of thought.

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nemofish · 12/10/2010 21:20

Sounds like your dd plateaued where my dsd did, roadkillbunny, unfortunately I don't feel she was ever helped with this. Sad Good that your dd is doing well though, it is awful when you see their confidence going.

I think the current wisdom is that mixed is best - I suppose some methods might suit an individual child better than another. I really struggled to learn to read, couldn't read or write properly at all until the age of seven, and I am now a real nit picker about spelling and grammar etc. Doesn't mean I get everything right though.

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ColdComfortFarm · 12/10/2010 21:21

All the studies show mixed is not best though. Phonics is objectively the best way to teach children to read. I learned c-a-t with my mother and my spelling is excellent!

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MaMoTTaT · 12/10/2010 21:27

DS2's school used to do it similar to how you describe when he was in reception, moving onto the phonics later in the school year irrc.

They then changed to doing mixed right from the start of reception by the time DS2 had started.

I'm not sure which one worked best tbh. It was over a year of phonics before DS1 "clicked" (he was nearly the end of YR1)......but then he didn't really click with any subject until the end of YR1 Hmm. Although his spelling was very good (and still is generally), and his comprehension fairly decent.

DS2 has clicked really quickly with the reading the words, but his comprehension and spelling still has a long way to go - and he's just started YR1.

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