Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

Please or to access all these features

Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

DS's school don't have phonic reading books. Shall I buy him some?

48 replies

thegrudge · 29/11/2010 18:17

DS is in reception, he is almost 5. He went to the nursery attached to the school and has spent over a year learning 'letters and sounds'. I think they do Jolly Phonics. He knows most of the sounds although not things like igh, ow etc.

All his reading books that he has brought home since starting reception are ORT Biff and Chip ones with what I think are termed 'look and learn' words with maybe one or two phonetic words in the whole book. He finds it both confusing and frustrating that he sounds out the letters but the word sounds quite different. They are words like oh, all, come and he just doesn't get it but when he comes to a phonetic word such as it, dog, dad he does well and is plesed with himself.

Should I keep going with just the ORTs? They do have a lot of words in that he needs to learn. Or should I get him some different books and if so can anyone recommend some?

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
WowOoo · 30/11/2010 12:16

Oh crap. Mean the vowel. Brain is frozen.

fruitful · 30/11/2010 12:26

We like Songbirds phonics. They come in sets (6 per level). The first level (purple) is 1+ / Pink in ORT, but phonics. They're by Julia Donaldson (gruffalo lady!) and ds1 likes the stories. Level 4 is about the same level as the Usborne phonics I reckon. You can get them 2nd-hand on ebay, or on Amazon. You can do the Look Inside thing on Amazon to see what the language is like.

Have a look in your library too, ours has a shelf of readers, some phonics. You just have to rummage till you find one that looks as though your child could read it though!

sarahfreck · 30/11/2010 13:50

magic or silent e demonstrated for children here www.starfall.com/n/make-a-word/silent-e/load.htm?f
excuse the american accent!

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 14:13

argh
I thought the ORT Biff and Chip ones WERE phonics based?

spudballoo · 30/11/2010 21:19

Oh WowOoe and sarahfreck thank YOU! yes now I get it...!

Greythorne, no...ORT Biff and Chip are Look and Say books.

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 21:22

Oh no
I am now completely confused

I thought look and say had been discredited???

help

Lydwatt · 30/11/2010 21:28

why are they called 'floppy's phonics' then? Confused

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 21:34

lydwatt
quite!

Lydwatt · 30/11/2010 21:38

and why does the Oxford website say this about biff and chip...

Floppy's Phonics consists of resources to help teach and practise phonics. Our new comprehensive phonics teaching programme Floppy's Phonics Sounds and Letters is a perfect fit with Floppy's Phonics Fiction and Non-fiction books, now fully matched to Letters and Sounds.

maizieD · 30/11/2010 22:07

Oxford University Press are after maximising their profits!

Their 'Look & Say' Biff & chip books (ORT) have been fantastic sellers, but as synthetic phonics is not only 'official guidance' but heavily favoured by the current government they have seen an opportunity to make even more money by offering a proper phonics based scheme as well...

Of course, they hope to profit, too by the sort of confusion that you are suffering from, by using an ORT character, Floppy, so people will go on buying ORT books by mistake...

Floppy's Phonics are what they say they are -phonics.

ORT is Look & Say, to be avoided until a child has mastered the basics of reading.

I also think that OUP are trying to get a monopoly on synthetic phonics programmes. They bought Ruth Miskin's Read Write Inc a few years ago.

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 22:50

maizieD
shit! i was completely taken in!
i am in france, so trying to make sense of the phonics / whole word / look and say quagmire

i had read on MN and www.dyslexics.org.uk/main_method_3.htmhere and come to the conclusion that synthetic phonics was the best / only way to go....but someone in England kindly gave me the ORT Read At home box set scheme and I assumed it was phonics based. Duh.

OK, back to square one. Is Jolly Phonics the best scheme to start off with? or should I buy Ruth Miskin's scheme?

Can we continue to use ORT (Chip, Biff et al) as story books (me reading aloud, not using them as learn to read material)?

It is soooooo complicated for a layperson in a foreign country. Bring back Peter and Jane.

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 22:51

I can't do links. Here we go again:

website on dyslexia and general reading issues

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 22:59

spudballoo
just read your long post above properly
i take your point that look and say has it's place (couldn't)

i am heading to amazon to check out songbirds and jolly phonics

any primary teachers who want to give me some dos and don'ts, i would be Grin

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 23:01

spudballoo
just read your long post above properly
i take your point that look and say has it's place (couldn't)

i am heading to amazon to check out songbirds and jolly phonics

any primary teachers who want to give me some dos and don'ts, i would be Grin

Greythorne · 30/11/2010 23:02

it's a bloody nightmare
now i see on amazon even songbirds by julia donaldson is branded Oxford Reading Tree
grrrrrrrrrrr

maizieD · 01/12/2010 09:56

Just because it is branded ORT it obviously isn't always Look & Say. Sorry, I hadn't realised just how bl**dy sneaky OUP are being here!

Floppy's phonics are absolutely fine, Songbirds are absolutely fine.

ORT Read at Home are not fine, except as books to share. Do not take any notice whatsoever of the advice to parents given in them. It's mostly absolute rubbish (I know exactly what they say because I have a set myself, I bought them on the 'know thine enemy' principle! Grin ).

Jolly Phonics is very good, Ruth Miskin's ReadWrite Inc is very good. You could also take a look at Phonics International, which is a very reasonably priced on-line programme www.phonicsinternational.com

I am sure that dyslexics.org.uk gives links to all the good synthetic phonics programmes. You can't go wrong with anything linked to from that site.

maverick · 01/12/2010 11:22

Here's my page of decodable book schemes:

www.dyslexics.org.uk/resources_and_further_11.htm

Couple of cautions:

Jolly Phonics books are designed to be read once Jolly Phonics basic code has been taught, not before.

Personally, I don't like OUP's Song Birds as I think the pictures are overwhelming and distracting, and the ones I've viewed include an overly large number of words containing as yet untaught code.

flickaty · 01/12/2010 12:26

dd's school use amixture of dandelion readers and jelly and bean phonics books to start with. Once they have completeled the entire phonics code so know all phonics sounds includidng things like 'igh' they move on to ORT and start somewhere between stage 3 and 5.
i thin thats this way works out really well and my dd in Y1 is a very confident reader.

maybe see if you can get some simple phonics books. i know that you can buy the dandelion readers individually.

spudballoo · 01/12/2010 13:16

Maverick, it was your excellent site that led me to Dandelion Readers which we are so enjoying. We have to 'get through' the bloody Biff & Chip storybook from school, and then we dive in to the Dandelion Readers. They are wonderful, I'm so pleased I found your site and took your advice.

xx

PS Thanks re the magic 'e' - yup it makes sense!

maverick · 01/12/2010 13:46

Thanks for heads-up for my website, spudballoo Smile

BTW, there's a special set of Dandelion readers for 'magic e'/split vowel reading practice.

www.phonicbooks.co.uk/page18.html

Lydwatt · 01/12/2010 15:50

ok, I see...there is an entirely different set of books based on Biff and Chip that is not the same (although it uses same characters) Floppy's phonics....

maizieD · 01/12/2010 17:52

Lydwatt,

Yeah, sneaky aren't they?!

Lydwatt · 01/12/2010 17:57

yeah!! Xmas Angry

New posts on this thread. Refresh page