AIBU to question whether my Year 7 still needs phonics?

It was look and say in my 80s primary - and here in wales the lack of direction from welsh government to use phonics leaving methods more up to schools is blamed for the PISA low reading scores compared to England.

My Dsis 5 years younger got a student teacher who used phonics and she had much fewer reading and writing issue than us older kids. DC primary in early 2010 in England was still using mixed methods - while paying lip service to phonics.

I thought it was around 80% of kids not explicitly taught phonics tend to work out the underlying patterns - but quick google suggest it around 40% of kids who can be taught reading with any method - and rest need some explict phonics teaching.

I think research suggest that phonics teaching help 99% of kids understand the code. Once you get past reading - spelling is opposite encoding not decoding and phonics helps there as well.

I think I partially had phonic code - two or three letter sounds being an issue till I taught my DC. Does that mean I struggle to pronounce unknown words - well yes and have been mocked for it. I often encounter new words reading and understood what they meant but pronouncing them correctly wasn't guaranteed. Despite extensive phonics support at home see this with DD1 as well and both of us have been tested and diagnosed as dsylexic.

Nonsense words test in Y2 was to find the kids who haven't grasped phonics - though DC first primary school in England had last minute home work fest to get kids past it. Some kids who could read did fail it at their school.

Look and say arrived in UK in 20s apparently but became most common reading method in 40s and dominated - with 70/80 doing a version with word context heavily thrown in- till 2006 in England when phonics was mandated.

How much if any phonics teaching any adult in UK got I think is very hard to actually say - as even if they had none in school they may of at home or in reading support groups - or they may have had none at all but be in that 40% that learns to read with any method. But I don't think you can assume all adults had some phonics teaching - I don't think I did and had to muddle and struggle through with my own coping mechanims teaching my own DC phonics certainly gave me more tools to use.

I would have thought that most adults were taught using phonics one way or another. It has been used for most of the last century on way or another. I was born in the 60s and was taught with phonics.
In fact I don't see how it is possible to read a word you haven't seen before without some level of phonics. How would you pronounce 'dromplewabble' or 'twotchilump' without it?

This is such nonsense. Most adults today won’t have been taught to read via phonics. This includes teachers, scientists, doctors and so on.

Phonics works for many children, but not all. It is simply a tool to achieve a result - being able to read. The OP’s daughter can seemingly read pretty well so she no longer needs phonics.

I never practiced phonics with my kids, I seem to recall our primary school saying leave it to them as parents can get phonics wrong. What I did do is read read read, mostly me reading to them, to foster a love of stories and reading. And not the school phonics books but fabulous childrens' books. Possibly an unpopular opinion but I think practicing school books and phonics at home can turn it into a pressure for the kids and turn the joy of reading and books into a chore. Some kids will love practicing at home and some kids will hate it. I really wouldn't force it if they don't want to. Reading should be a pleasure.

Both children very confident writers and reader and now in late teens

My phonics skills are dire, got picked up at university. Hadn’t really had any impact til then, showed up as a few specific issues in specialist terminology.

From that angle I’d say it’s not the be all and end all, but it’s worth gently keeping ticking over. Weirdly, learning other languages (classic and modern) probably helped me more than working on phonics in English did.

eg. I managed that eclectic, electric, eccentric thing earlier up the post but it took me a good few moments.

Also worth keeping the associated skills in mind. Eg. Most peoples proof reading own writing skills are pretty poor, mine are bad for errors that phonic skills would pick up regardless of whether I wrote it or someone else. I had to massively beef up my exam question reading and answer checking skills to succeed in uni exams.

I skim read very effectively for most things. Where details matter, I rely on the study skills tuition I had for techniques to compensate. If she never gets it, that’s an angle to consider.

I’d say she’s well ahead since the average adult reading age in the UK is 9-11. Like millions of she’s doesn’t know a word Im sure she sounds it out or asks you.

Many of us learned to read before phonics became popular. It is just one method of many.

@shuffleofftobuffalo that’s really interesting what you say about reading rate. One of the things picked up when DS was assessed, was that his reading rate was 2 years ahead of his chronological age.

DS really struggled with phonics. He could hardly read at all by Y3, his (private) school suspected dyslexia so we had him assessed by an educational psychologist. He’s not dyslexic, he just had a very specific issue with phonics. He’s was one of the children phonics simply didn’t work for. School immediately took him out of phonics and taught him to read by sight. He quickly caught up and we’ve had no issues since.

He got 8’s and 9’s in his GCSE’s (8’s in English Lang & Lit) and is on track for A*’s/A’s at A Level in History, Classics & Politics. If you’d told me when he was in Y3 his ‘passion’ subjects would be humanities/essay based subjects, I’d have thought you’d got the wrong child.

As a fluent reader phonics will slow her down and mean she can’t absorb the information as it’s being fed into her brain as fast. An average reading word is about 230 words per minute, even if she’s half of this speed if you think about how slow phonics makes you read it’s not going to work is it.

if they are doing it because she is mispronouncing words or not able to work them out, that’s an indicator of something like dyslexia and phonics won’t help her (season dyslexic and helper of dyslexic school children here!)

Phonics is “the thing” recognised as being the way kids learn to read. I’ve found that many teachers are simply not equipped with wider reading tools because they are trained to do phonics. It’s not their fault, but it sounds like your DD’s teacher may fall into that category. Stage an intervention!

If she lucky and spelling not an issue - focus on the maths - or very least the problem areas.

I could never do mental arithmetic - but am actually very good at maths - short term memeory issues can't spell or do sums in my head - paper or fingers to hold data I'm great.

She's lucky - however she is reading she doing well and if spelling not far behind she's doing really well. I never caught up with the spelling - and while my kids are much better than I was they are still classed as poor spellers compare to what you'd expect with rest of their levels. We are not people who see a word and can read it and know how to spell it from then on - I know they exist. In fact despite reading extensively it never despite teachers insistence it would did it much improve my spelling.

I'm dyslexic wasn't taught phonics and when teaching my own DC it became clear two three letter combinations sounds no idea about.

From about mid key stage 2 could read well - in fact did really well on reading tests but rely heavily on sentence context and having a wide vocbulary from reading and family - TV radio exposure.

There was/is an issue with pronouncing unusal words even if knew what they meant. Also similar shpaed words can and do still throw me - usually now place names rather than proper words. I often read what I think is there as well - so have to be very careful in exams. Main issue was spelling - and why I sought dsylexia diagonsis and was found to have it. I wasn't diagonsed till Uni so while it presented issues I was doing well.

Also had issue with instant recall for timetables - but have maths A-level - though lost time working a few timetables out every time.

For my kids - made sure they were rock soild in maths basics - one like me had a really episodic and good long term memroy and others have extremely poor working memories - it was explinations and a lot of practise in end. We used on-line site that taught maths like DH and I learnt in school that sadly no-longer working for new people. Basically over years of frequent pratcise it finally stuck and then they had very fast recall.

Could she read eccentric, eclectic, electric all correctly?
Eclectic would have tripped me up at younger ages and would have relied on sentence context to pick it out - the L and c would mean I could mix it up with other two words. There were two roads near one place we lived both with post offices down - no-one else mixed them up but they looked similar same length and same style of letters - I mixed them up a lot.

If she reading well I'd not focus on reading and phonics.

If she does has spelling issues may be worth looking at phonics based programs for spelling like https://www.soundfoundations.co.uk/learning-to-spell/ - though there a lot of practise built in with that as well.

@Passmethecheese So how did she get into the school then? Around here places in SpLD units are like hens teeth. We don’t have a state SpLD school. Parents wanting these schools get the LA to pay for private, and that’s not given easily without all sorts of evidence.

My dyslexic 11 year old has a reading age of 13.5 and enjoys classics like Mansfield Park. She can't spell or remember times tables. Or phonics!!

Another (retired) teacher here saying she obviously doesn't need phonics, she's reading fluently now. Fluent readers don't sound words out, they simply read.
I have a qualification from the British Dyslexia Institute which advocates using phonics when teaching children and adults to read but that doesn't mean that I think it is the only effective strategy for anyone learning to read.
I wish that phonics wasn't being pushed at the expense of all the other strategies that successful fluent readers use. Harder texts that she will meet in secondary school will need strong comprehension skills not phonics.

Toe to Toe is multi sensory but still phonics based though isn't it?

IMO phonics is the best way to teach kids to read and write, it's been around a long time and was how i was taught in the late 70's early 80's. I'm not so keen on all the 'pure' sounds 'mmmm' and 'llllll' particularly are hard for children to consistently pronounce correctly IME from listening to readers. I prefer 'muh' and 'luh' even if they're not perfect as they're so much easier to pronounce. Try sounding out mum when you use 'mmm' - not perfect either!

That's not to say phonics works perfectly for everyone but I think anyone still struggling with phonics by age 7/8 should be screened for dyslexia. Has your DD been screened OP? Sorry if i missed that. I definitely think if phonics isn't working the way it's being taught by yr 3 then other alternative approaches are definitely required. To still be pushing it at Yr 7 would be pointless and ridiculous IMO.

The alternatives to teaching phonics to young children are pretty limited though - basically Look and Say which requires you to remember how to read and spell each word as a whole. It failed as a method when it was tried and most kids didn't learn to read. What other alternatives are there really? There are a number of different ways to tackle phonics that might help kids with them - and a lot of schools use more multi sensory approaches with sand trays etc - but phonics is still the best way of teaching kids to read and write.

Google says 'Phonics does not work for many children with dyslexia because it primarily relies on the exact brain functions that are impaired by the condition, specifically, the ability to process, remember, and connect sounds (phonemes) to letters (graphemes).' So IMO once it becomes clear that phonics aren't working then kids should be getting screened for dyslexia - I just don't understand why that doesn't happen in schools?

Quit the phonics OP and leave her to progress in her own way, encouraging her to read as much as possible and check any words she's unsure of with you.

I’ll make my own judgements on what is suitable or not thank you.

I am happy with her reading the first 4. I have said she can’t have the rest yet. But it has absolutely fuck all to do with you if I did.

Ps Harry Potter goblet of fire isn't really suitable for a year 1 child. My 9 year could easily read Bridgerton but I'm not giving it to them.

A good guide for a book is whether the characters are roughly similar ages to the reader. Generally speaking books with teenage characters aren't really suitable for a 6 year old for whom the themes and content are too mature.

Most bright children who learn like this simply recognise & apply the phonic code unconsciously. I was like this, I had no trouble explaining phonics to my own DC despite never being "taught" it. It's quite intuitive if your brain works that way.

You also won’t work out “colonel”, “buoy” “Hermione” or “choir” from phonics.