Reading and Phonics!

[MumPops34]

Hi,
I’m wondering if there are any teachers on here, who can give me some advice please. My daughter is 5 (summer born), she’s missed out on a lot of schooling due to the pandemic and also had quite a few sick days in reception before the pandemic. In her report she was below in reading, I want to support her more at home and have asked her teacher before lockdown on various occasions if she was able to suggest things to support her at home, I heard nothing more. Then lockdown happened and we have no suitable books to read and to be honest I don’t know where to start with everything. I have no idea on sound buttons and the different phases of phonics which have been provided for online learning, so I feel I am unable to teach her effectively, or even confident I am showing her the correct way. Can someone please tell me how to teach her to read and how the phonics work please, I don’t want to ask her teacher again, as I appreciate she’s very busy but feel my daughter is going to be held back further.

I 100 percent recommend the reading eggs app. Currently 30day free trial. The difference in my 6 year old has been amazing. She really enjoys it too. It's fun and engaging.

Jolly Phonics is quite a widely used scheme for phonics:
www.jollylearning.co.uk/school-closure-support-for-parents/

This youtube channel is useful for phonics video lessons for Reception and Year 1
www.youtube.com/channel/UCP_FbjYUP_UtldV2K_-niWw/playlists

Oxford Owl has lots of free reading books:
www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home/find-a-book/library-page/

Teach Your Monster to Read is a good, free phonics app too.

Reading eggs is fantastic

Mr Thornes phonics and Alphablocks on YouTube will help massively.

Hi, this YouTube channel has parent guides and daily videos that you could both watch. www.youtube.com/channel/UCP_FbjYUP_UtldV2K_-niWw sorry, I'm not sure how to do a proper link.

Reading eggs!

Also Teach your Monster to read is a good app. Alphablocks on Cbeebies is good to watch, start with the first episode, it will help you with the correct sounds. Pure phonics is used now, not like when we were at school, its t not t-uh, parents can struggle with this as they dont realise its changed. If you google pure phonics on YouTube there are plenty of videos to watch.
By the end of reception children are expected to working within phase 4 phonics. They start at phase 2. Perhaps go back to the beginning to see what sounds are missing. Buy some letter flash cards or make some. Practise segmenting and blending, segmenting is when you break the word up c-a-t, bit like robot talk and then blend the sounds together.
Also have a look at High Frequency Words, so the, to, go, and etc. If a child can read these quickly it helps to speed up fluency.
Make it fun x

Another vote for reading eggs and they have 30 days free. It’s brilliant and my DD loves it.

Also phonics play is free at the moment. I’ve not tried it yet but came highly recommended by a teacher
www.phonicsplay.co.uk/

Good luck

I’m all for letting the teachers get on with it and not bothering them with trivial stuff but I think this is a completely reasonable thing to bother the teacher about actually, even given the pandemic.

Reading has got to be one of, if not the most important thing they learn in R/KS1 and it’s not encouraging that you’ve asked how to support your DD several times and had no reply. I think if I emailed my kids’ teachers about this during office hours I would probably get a reply within 24 hours, certainly within 7 days.

Your DD is obviously going to learn to read as she has a parent who cares but I think that the school should be supporting you more.

You can set up a free account here and access phonics books to read

www.oxfordowl.co.uk/library-page?view=image&query=&type=book&age_group=&level=&level_select=&book_type=&series=Oxford+Reading+Tree

It's vitally important that you make it pleasurable and avoid any pressure. Read funny books to her and once she knows them she can read them back to you. Read poems and recipes and road signs. Write her letters and see if she can work out what they say. It has to be fun and meaningful or she won't want to.

My son does the Ruth Miskin phonics videos on YouTube

Thanks all so much, will take a look at the recommendations 🙂

@MumPops34

Reading chest, it sends you real books from a range of school reading schemes eg ours is Oxford Reading tree. I can put in her level and choose books to be sent t us.
I can also look at other books from the same level but different reading schemes.

There are 3 levels of subscription, we pay 20 a month for unlimited swaps.

I get roughly 6 real books a week and send them back. It means I can keep dd going on her reading scheme's.

Having a real physical book is also a bonus. I'm very impressed with reading chest and the service.

In addition I also rate reading eggs along side reading chest.

Get flash cards for the first 100 hfw. These are the building blocks of reading and many children find them much easier to learn with flash cards.

That's utterly really. 10 mons reading chest, flash Cards a couple a day and reading chest books, a few pages a day.

In total perhaps no more than 20 mins and not in one go but should make a huge difference.

Just to add, pick on 'scheme' or phonics programme and stick to it, don't jump about and confuse her. Even in school we are strongly advised to have fidelity to one programme.

The DFE Letters and Sounds sets out the broad structure and content if you want more information to help you. Many of the above fit into this. This includes phase 1 which your daughter may also need to support her. Phase 1 runs through phonics teaching even when children move on to letters.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/letters-and-sounds