Is this a poor approach to reading from school and am I making it worse?

[lecce]

Ds is in reception and I am a little concerned about how the school seems to be approaching reading.

Things I am happy with:

• He only knew a few letters by sight when he started and now knows all - upper and lower case.

-He knew all sounds of basic letters before starting but now knows all letter 'names' and sounds.

• He is clearly learning to read - had done nothing in this area before school.

Things that worry me:
-There is only one comment in his reading book from school - written by the TA about 5 weeks ago. How does the teacher know anything about his progress?

-They send home words for him to learn. These are not decodable (at his level) and they are only supposed to be sent a new set when the previous one has been mastered. The first 3 sets ds loved but now we have 7 sets and he just finds them confusing. I have several times commented in his book that he finds them confusing and prefers decoding but the school continue to send more. He has not mastered the last 3 sets yet subsequent ones (and certificates congratulating him on learning words he hasn't learnt )have been sent.

-Books sent home seem to be completely random. I wouldn't have a clue what level he is on and most are not decodable (last one had guinea pig - what a waste of time). This has led to a lot of frustration on his part as he tends to try and use the pictures and I try and stop him and conflict ensues. He only gets one a week and I have commented that he is frustrated because he clearly enjoys the phonics sessions they do in class abd wants to be able to use them, but no one ever responds to my comments and similar books come home the next week.

I now more or less ignore what comes home from school and use other stuff. He abolutlely loves Starfall (though we've nearly exhausted it now) and I've got some Usbourne phonics books which he also likes because they have a bit of a plot. However, neither of these are completely the right level and I have been saying stuff like, "The 'a' and the 'r' make 'ar' in this word," and if I do that he will blend it fine. I have also told him about 'magic' and 'silent' 'Es' and, if I tell him which it is he can decode the word from there. However, I am a little worried that what I am doing is 'wrong' and will be counter-productive for him later. I am also a bit worried about basically ignoring the stuff school send home as I don't want to appear arrogant or unsuportive.

Thanks for reading.

When my dd age 8 was in Reception she had 45 HF words to learn. now they have 100! Insane.

My ds in R has the HF words which he takes home, BUT dc should not be moving onto the next set of hf woprds till they KNOW the first set immediately, without having to sound them out. they shold also be reading books as well - we change books 3x per week.

DS is on the Jelly and Bean ones, so cvc/cv/cvccc words etc. They should go together. He should certainly be listened to more often than your ds (I go into our school to hear readers 1 afternoon a week). HAve a word with your teacher and see what she says.

hth

Why do they need to know the first set without having to sound them out before being allowed to move on?

I change books as often as they need to be changed whether that is once a week or five times a week ...

and why do they need to memorise 100 words which include a, am, an, as, at, in, is, it, on, up... ?

Definitely insane and not the way that the government guidance says they should be taught. Nor, if I recall rightly, does it say that they all have to be learned in Reception. It's 100 over 2/3 years.

Government guidance stresses that they should be taught as 'tricky' words, decodable but with a tricky bit. I wish the guidance had been a bit braver and done away with them altogether because of the tendency for poorly trained teachers to think that they are 'undecodable' and teach them as 'wholes'.

and why do they need to memorise 100 words which include a, am, an, as, at, in, is, it, on, up... ?

But mrz, don't you know that they are HFWs and therefore uniquely different from all the other words in the English language

We haven't had the 100HF words in our school, although we do now have some words that are supposed to be learned without sounding out, I assume to increase fluency. Personally I think it's good. My dsis tutors a girl who is in Y4 and still sounding out every single word. She's just stuck in this, I guess from it being hammered home, and has not broken out of it. She can read them all but even words like 'am' get sounded out, which obviously makes reading slow. Dsis is coming up with strategies to break her out of this. I can see my ds1 could have been there, he can get 'stuck' in things too, so I am glad we are encouraging him now to start 'speed' recognition or whatever it is. The words are ones that he can easily sound out 'mum', 'dad', 'am' etc. but he is supposed to be able to read them without sounding.

mrz, what I meant was that ds1 spent the WHOLE of reception learning the letters of the alphabet (phonetically) and sounding out words. He never had a book. Can you believe it?

There are 100 words for reception and a further 200 for KS1

If your child's teacher is using Letters and Sounds to teach reading and your child is being given the HFWs to memorise as whole units, you might like to show their teacher the following from the L&S 'notes of guidance'.

''Even the core of high frequency words which are not transparently decodable using known grapheme?phoneme correspondences usually contain at least one GPC that is familiar. Rather than approach these words as though they were unique entities, it is advisable to start from what is known and register the ?tricky bit? in the word. Even the word yacht, often considered one of the most irregular of English words, has two of the three phonemes represented with regular graphemes'' (L&S Notes of Guidance p16)

MerryMarigold some children just need to be told they don't need to sound out words they can clearly read because a few children will continue to sound out the same words no matter how many times they encounter it on the page. Sometimes it just takes a reminder " you've just read that word can you remember?"
It's the ones who say woz and sed that make me

at woz and sed sounded out. Why do they do it? That's what I mean though...if sounding out is hammered home for a couple of years, it must be hard to get out of the habit, if you are habit-prone person. I'm sure she's been told many times she doesn't have to sound out the words, because this is a specific issue she's getting help with in tutoring, and her parents are forking out for a trained KS2 teacher to help her with it!

at woz and sed sounded out. Why do they do it?

In my experience it's because an adult has demonstrated it (and yes usually it has been mum although I've encountered a few people in schools)
If the child has been taught the ai in said is tricky and represents they like to show off that knowledge so will at least sound our sed and if they know that a after "w" represents they say wos

Would Ofsed look during inspection at how children are taught to read? And if so, would the school that uses mixed methods or whole word recognition get 'lower marks' from them. The reason I'm asking is it looks like my DD's school doesn't use only phonics. it worries me a bit, as she brings books home with words like rabbits, spaceman, etc, and I know they haven't covered those sounds yet. The school is very oversubscribed, Ofsted outstanding for years, also results at KS1 are much much higher than average. It would seem strange that they teach reading badly and it wouldn't have been noticed by Ofsted...

Interesting question, bluewednesday. Surely schools are allowed to come out with whatever strategies will work for them. For example, ds1's school is in a very poor area and is more than 80% ESL, so it would need a different literacy strategy where most kids come from English speaking homes and have (perhaps) had more 'teaching' at home.

The new Ofsted inspection involves the inspectors listening to readers so it will be picked up in future inspections.

The new Ofsted framework, which comes into force from January 2012 is supposed to have a strong focus on synthetic phonics and the teaching of reading in EY & KS1 & 2.

Which sounds very promising, but, most Ofsted Inspectors have probably never taught SP and, although they are getting training in it, I suspect that it might be easy for a school to pull the wool over their eyes, or for them to be satisfied with poor SP teaching.

It will be interesting to see how it works.

My DS has been taught his Jolly Phonics beautifully in his reception class. He is decoding really well. Sadly his school are sending him home with ORT first word (The Headache is this week ffs).

The question is, should I bring it up with them? I am hoping they will give me some supply work so I am hesitating whilst bringing DS books from my current school .

For example, ds1's school is in a very poor area and is more than 80% ESL, so it would need a different literacy strategy where most kids come from English speaking homes and have (perhaps) had more 'teaching' at home.

You might not be aware that Ruth Miskin, who developed the ReadWrite Inc programme, developed it when she was the headteacher of a school in similar circumstances to the one you describe. Her school consistently achieved over 90% L4 and above in English at the end of KS2 and no child left unable to read. I would think that shows that ESL children don't need anything different as far as learning to read is concerned.

That's probably why our school uses RWI !

Well, judging from some threads on here, our school goes A LOT slower...

''For example, ds1's school is in a very poor area and is more than 80% ESL, so it would need a different literacy strategy where most kids come from English speaking homes''

I don't understand why you think 'a different strategy' is needed from synthetic phonics?

Elmhurst Primary is in Newham, east London, an area of high deprivation. Synthetic phonics (Read Write Inc) is the sole method of teaching children to read at the school and, as a consequence, they have no 'dyslexics'. The headteacher, Shahed Ahmed, says, ?More than 90 per cent of our pupils speak English as an additional language and we have 20 per cent mobility''. The school 'has 1,000 pupils and not one of them leaves unable to read' (TES.12/08/11)

I don't understand why you think 'a different strategy' is needed from synthetic phonics?

I didn't say a different strategy from synthetic phonics was needed did I?

I said that I would be surprised that schools would have THE SAME strategy if their children have very different backgrounds. I am basing this on the fact some close friends who live 5 mins away (but v different areas) have a child in YR and she is doing what ds1 in Y1 is doing now. The other child is also in Y1 and has had reading/ spelling/ HFW's since YR, which ds1 doesn't. I assume the strategy is different. They also have the 100HFW which we don't.

Just defending the school's right to decide as they know 'their' kids, rather than OFSTED applying a general criteria across the board.

My DD's school have just got a 'break' from Ofsted inspections so won't be inspected soon. Shame, as it would be very interesting to find out what they are really up to. I have no idea how they teach the children, they just state they use mixture of methods and schemes. My dd brought home some first words to learn this week, including mum, dad, and. I think these are decodable ones. She also got 'the'. Is it something they are supposed to know before they cover th sound?

(Btw, we also do RWI, but got low literacy scores, so I guess it's not just about RWI - and there seems to have been a revision of literacy strategy this yr, which I think must be coming from governors/ teachers etc)

They were doing RWi very strictly (with low scores) but are no longer, just to be clear

Just defending the school's right to decide as they know 'their' kids, rather than OFSTED applying a general criteria across the board.

The school's 'right to know their kids' won't wash with Ofsted if their data is not in line with, or better than, comparable schools. They would have to have a very convincing 'story' to explain lower attainment.

So I guess "comparable schools" means OFSTED would not be comparing to just 'any' school, but ones with similar poverty/ ESL levels. Which was (sort of) my original point about strategies being different depending on the intake.

I don't think I've met a teacher yet who rates OFSTED judgment anyway! Maybe it's just the ones I know.