Phonics - 5 year old difficulties

[LostMum2019]

Hello,
seeking help, guidance & reassurance

We have a little boy who has just turned 5, he has been introduced to a phonics program to learn to read.

The school provided flash cards with words to learn to read/ blend. They provided the same cards for 5-6 months.

Apparently they have working of the same 8 letters - learning to blend letters together in order to read all this time.

I approached the school and asked for an alternative activity. They returned them to us saying ‘this is approach we use ‘

I explained that our little was upset by just seeing the cards and it was affecting his wellbeing.

How long did your little ones take to recognise that the letter sounds form words.- learn to blend ? How long did your child stay on the first set ?

We are upset for our little boy - that they school are not willing to provide an alternative activity to meet his needs / engage him better. Are our expectation too high ?

Just get some simple books and start reading together. Have him say as many of the words as he can. Pick a few to help
Him sound out.

Yanbu - my child is the same age and she had books straight away. Obviously they only included a few words/sounds but it increased her confidence as she had almost no knowledge of reading before.
She can pick up most books suitable for her age and read them now (with some hesitations/ mistakes)

Which phonics programme is it? We use Read Write Inc which, when done properly, is the best ever in my opinion.
Ruth Miskin who 'invented' it has put up loads of videos on youtube during lockdown to help parents and the flashcards and books are available on Amazon. Children move up the groups as soon as they are confident with the sounds they have been taught so the more able are kept engaged.

Teacher here. Didn’t want to read and run.

Are you in the UK?

The general approach is to start with s, a, t, p, i, and n, then move onto other sounds when ready (the full list is available at lettersandsounds.uk). There are LOADS of online resources including phonics play website which is currently free due to corona virus, and bbc bite size/CBeebies also have their own videos and resources.

I massively recommend biff, chip and kipper books - you can buy packs of each level on Amazon. Start with level 1 and work your way upwards. Phonics is the recommended approach in schools now however it should be in a “print rich environment”. Only in books will kids see the words they’re learning in context and begin to make the connection between what they can “do” with words and what it all means.

Should your child’s school be doing more? If you are in a country currently under lockdown there is not much more they can do at present I’m afraid. That’s not the schools fault.

At 5 you also want to make his learning multi sensory and fun - so as you learn each sound, try making the letter out of buttons, or play doh, or draw it in sand or lentils - he is a bit too little for desk based or wrote learning.

Hope that helps!

Could you watch Alpha Club or watch Jolly Phonics at all? You could start with that.
Also, the Reception lessons on the Oak National Academy from week 1 will help him work his way through phonics.

Sorry, Alpha Club is an autocorrect. I meant Alphablocks..

I see you have been given really good solid advice already, but I just wanted to add that whilst phonics is the blanket approach used in schools, it definitely doesn't suit every child. My daughter never got on with phonics, she really just didn't understand it at all, but I agree that Biff & Chip books are excellent, and reading, reading and more reading really helps.

If it is in England the school have to publish on their website which phonics programme they follow. Which one is it?

Have you had his eyesight and hearing tested?

As well as phonics play, I am using the free ebooks from Oxford Owl:

www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home/find-a-book/library-page/

And using these Letters and Sounds videos - go for the learning to blend probably, or the reception ones if they're too easy.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuGr6z2H2KNGIYp03sdzSGLZquzuQENkx

I've also printed bits of Twinkl which is currently free to help.

Apologies, I’m genuinely not trying to be difficult but why is he getting upset just looking at the cards?

The best thing I found with my Son was to turn it in to a game. So put the cards on the floor at one end of the living room and call out a letter or sound and he has to run and grab it, and repeat for each card. Then he can try to beat his time, or you can take a turn and he has to check if your cards are right. You could ask him to find the cards to spell out cvc words. You could make bigger cards out of A4 paper and he has to jump on C-A-T for example.

Is the phonics scheme Read Write Inc? If so try the videos on the Read Write Inc YouTube channel. There are set 1, 2 and 3 videos each school day available for 24 hours. There are other videos on there too though.

The Julia Donaldson Songbirds phonics books are good if you want to get a set of books for home, or the free ebooks as mentioned upthread.

Why does he get upset? I would leave the 'phonics' to the teacher and just read books with him or to him tbh.

Dark dark night has good suggestions. We used to put cards around the room or have dd jump from card to card. We never just sat and drilled.

Put a few near the door or fridge/treat and say it’s a password. So today’s password is whatever and he can have a treat for picking the right one however many guesses it takes. Get other to join in.

But games apps drawings chalk sand water bath time etc are better than sit down learning

I'm teaching DD2 to read at the mo. Her soon-to-be school in Sept uses the Read Write Inc scheme (which does use a lot of flash cards), so I have taught her using that. As mentioned, there are videos online, but I have had an introduction to RWI session at school and observed a couple of phonics lessons with DD1, so I've copied that teaching style. Luckily I already had the home pack of sound cards etc, which has helped.

I taught her the set 1 sounds (all the single letters plus a few digraphs), then we concentrated on learning to blend. Twinkl has some good phonics games like match the word to the picture which DD2 really enjoyed. We also use the Teach Your Monster To Read app. The app is recommended by the school and both DCs love it. I found blending is a 'penny drop' thing, but what really helped was listening to her sister sound out words for her spellings. That made the link for her. DD1's reception teacher used to recommend saying things at home like "please can you get your b-a-g?", which is the same thing.

To read books you need to teach them to sight read a few basic tricky/red words (eg the). I found the Biff Chip books at level 1 have too many tricky/red words that I haven't taught her yet (eg made), but found Songbirds to be much better. She is reading Songbirds level 2 now but Biff Chip level 1.

In terms of timescales, DD2 is younger than your DS. She knew her letter sounds this time last year, but didn't 'get' blending until about 2 months ago. That leap to reading has taken a long time.
DD1 learned to read in reception. She went in only knowing half the letter sounds but was on RWI set 2 books and knew all set 1&2 sounds by the end of the Autumn term. There is a huge variation in ability in her class though (she's Y1 now). Some are free readers and some are still on level 3 or 4.

I appreciate it is a difficult time now- I don’t expect support during this time.

I spoke to the school in February after receiving the same flashcards for 4-5 for homework.

I asked for an alternative activity in February. The class teacher sent the same cards home and said ‘this is how we do it’. No suggestion on what games to play etc. No help was offered to us.

When I asked how to present the words- they give all the words in the set to a child. In no particular order. E.g Pin, cat, map etc

My lo knows all the sounds within the alphabet but can’t seem to blend.

I think they have overwhelmed my lo by not provided words in groups so they an see a pattern.
(E.g cat mat pat ) Perhaps I’m not grasping the process and I’m totally off the mark with this suggestion ??

Play some listening games where he counts the sounds in a word you say in slow motion. Like sss aaa t. Then leave gaps between sounds and model how to blend to hear the word.

Search YouTube for 'pronunciation of phonemes' and watch Ruth Miskin's clip to be sure you're not confusing the child by saying suh, luh, tuh etc.

Then just write him some words and sentences to read using the sounds he knows. Avoid using alphabet names for letters at this stage and be sure to use lower case letters when you write.

We made games too.

Posting the sound cards into a home made letterbox.

Finding objects that matched the sounds. Can you find the /c/a/t/.

Sounding out in day to day life. 'This is the /b/oo/k/ book'.

I wanted to say thank you for response. We really appreciate it!

Meant to be included in the above message x

My 5 year old is in reception and can't blend or segment at all. She too was getting really distressed.

Therefore I leave the phonics to school and at home we just sit and share stories together.

@Feenie I have just tagged a very knowledgeable teacher of Phonics (hope that is okay Feenie!) who will have better advice than me but my DD who was also 5 this month has been doing a mixture of reading with me (Biff and Chip books provided by the school) and flash cards but I also bought Alphablock books from Amazon which she preferred to start off with because it visually helps with the blending of the Phonics sounds. She is now, a few weeks later, doing much better with the Biff and Chip books, after lots of the Alphablock books.

I also have been doing the Oak National Academy lessons for Reception children and there is some Phonics and blending of three letter words there too. Start from week 1 if you haven’t seen them yet.
Lastly, Alphablocks have got a new website with activities and you can also buy their back catalogue of 6 alphablock magazines from ‘5 Minute Fun’ if you Google that.

However, if this interferes with what looks like the Read Write Inc method, Feenie may help.

Teacher here:

The advice you've got from others is sensible. If the cards are upsetting him, dump them. He's clearly associating them with something he finds hard. Move them into a different medium, such as magnetic letters, or shaping the letters with playdough.

Blending is a difficult skill, and some kids get it faster than others.

What I used to do with my reception classes would be to write 3 letter words on cards, spread them around the playground, and would have children run to them as I called them out. Making it fast and exciting.

I appreciate it is a difficult time now- I don’t expect support during this time.

I disagree. My DGC's schools have been amazingly helpful. Any problems/issues, more resources or work needed and they've been there.

But luckily you've had some brilliant ideas upthread.

And if you do get the books, you may spot whether your DC uses phonics and 'decodes' the words or just memorises them and learns them that way (or a mixture of both)

But reading to and with is absolutely an essential part of learning to read. ANY good books too, not just scheme ones.

Thank you.

Our lo used to love books, we often read book after book together- sometimes 10 or more in a row, on request from our lo.

Since lockdown we are reading more books together again. I had begun to feel that the flashcards etc had spoilt that. Reading/listening to a story had been a chore for our lo. We have always read together daily but our lo is requesting stories again.

Reading and book had become a negative. Hopefully we are