The new Y1 phonics screening check

[SoundsWrite]

The government's new phonics screening check is to be launched in England in June.
The results of the test will be given to the parents of each individual child but each individual school's results will not be made public.
What is the view on Mumsnet? Do you think the results should be made public or not? Either way, why or why not?
You can find out more about this test by going to the DfE site: www.education.gov.uk/schools/teachingandlearning/pedagogy/a00198207/faqs-year-1-phonics-screening-check

You can get 19 people together to write a letter about anything,it's not difficult.

Other signatories include Dr Rona Tutt - past president of the National Association of Head Teachers, writer and researcher whom, to my knowledge, has never in her life taught anyone to read.

Philip Parkin, another union leader - Voice. At least he has taught in infant schools - but is he one of the many teachers who consistently failed those 20% using mixed methods?

John Coe - don't know much about him, but I think he is a journalist/researcher, not a teacher.

These people's opinions on a phonics screening check are not holding much weight, imo. No wonder noone took any notice of the letter.

Lily I'm neither for nor against the test.
Good teachers have been using a similar test for years to identify children who aren't able to decode effectively - as part of the Letters & Sounds program (or one of the many commercial programs available - I use the advanced code test on Phonics International) so it shouldn't be necessary to have a National test but you only have to visit parents and teachers forums to see that there is still lots of schools where phonics is taught badly or not at all. So I can accept the argument that it is needed to identify these schools as well as to identify those children who may need more support.
My position is the test shouldn't be necessary

Lily would you recommend this flexibility in other tests?

Instead of taking her driving test in a car can my daughter do it on roller skates?

It's what's usually meant in a conversation re reading teaching, Lily.

I'm not sure why you are placing so much importance on the newspaper report, either. It contains the opinion of just one person, who is only against the money spent on the test. He doesn't seem to have any misgivings about the test itself.

as one of my main gripes is that it is confusing for a more able reader (and this is backed up by both the report and the letter)

Where? I can't see anywhere where the report mentions problems for more able children and I can't find anywhere in the letter that mentions this either.

John Coe is General Secretary of the National Association for Primary Education

Lily - I am very heavily influenced by mrz and feenies opinion. And do you know why? Because they teach all children to read.

Most year 1 teachers don't. So when you tell me you know teachers who don't agree with it, that holds no weight with me - because I don't know how many children your friends fail.

Same with the signatures on the letter. If they routinely fail children they're hardly going to cheer for a test that highlights their inadequacies.

I only have 3 children. My youngest was taught phonics from day 1 and is a very good reader. My eldest 2 weren't and haven't recovered from the damage done yet.

Anything that makes proper phonics teaching more embedded in the classroom gets my staunch support.

There never is a perfect solution to anything. Best is the enemy of good enough.

I'm fairly sure this test passes the 'good enough' mark.

It would have helped both my failed kids a lot.

is unnecessary in promoting the already present teaching of phonics

And this phrase from the letter is so clearly utter garbage that makes me doubt the veracity of the rest of their claims. It is clear they know absolutely NOTHING about the state of phonics teaching in our schools.

I go into classrooms where teachers claim they are teaching phonics and I despair. I talk to teachers who openly admit they are clueless about phonics and I despair.
I talk to those who train new teachers and they tell me 2 sessions are allocated to phonics and I despair.

Part of my SLE role is now to provide phonics training for GTPs. The initial remit was to cover phonics and guided reading in one 3 hour session. This would be all the phonics instruction these student teachers had. Once I'd stopped laughing, I not-very-politely refused to do it. They have restarted negotiations at 3 days worth of training for GTPs.

we remain in discussion.

It's just scandalous, isn't it? What's the matter with people?

"Lily would you recommend this flexibility in other tests?

Instead of taking her driving test in a car can my daughter do it on roller skates?"

I would recommend the flexibility I have suggested - ie taking the test at the point when you are ready to do so, not a fixed number of days after your 17th birthday. That's what I said below. The suggestion about roller skates is just stupid, and you are trying to make me look stupid.

"Where? I can't see anywhere where the report mentions problems for more able children confused and I can't find anywhere in the letter that mentions this either."

Well I've linked to it twice, and quoted it on here, here it is again;

"Finally, the evaluation of the pilot informs us that 72% of schools experienced difficulties in relation to the use of pseudo words and that some able readers were confused. This confirms our previously expressed worry that the use of a test of only the decoding aspect of reading could actually harm standards in the longer term, with able readers mistakenly identified as needing further teaching of phonics and being held back as a result."

It's complete and utter madness they are turning out teachers who don't know how to teach the essential skills- not just reading but letter formation, counting etc

Oh that report - I thought you meant the news report, which you also linked to.

We've explained how the issue relating to the use of pseudo words has been addressed, Lily. It's not the same issue as yours.

It really is bonkers, mrz.

No Lily I'm try to show you that in order for a child to pass a decoding test they need to decode not make guesses

Yes I KNOW.

I understand the logic of phonics. I like phonics.

I was simply illustrating how a child who is a really good reader can be tripped up in a way that does not need any phonics interventions.

That's all.

And for THAT you want the whole thing derailed, thereby missing the chance of making sure that schools stop failing ALL these children? Because, as you perceive it, one child DIDN'T make a mistake - even though several experts have told you he did, and how to learn from it?

Feenie, do you even read any of my posts?

I don't believe the test will pick up the right children.

I do believe it will pick up some wrong children.

In a nutshell, I don't think it is a good use of time, and I suspect it won't actually help the children it is supposed to help.

You don't know that it will, or that it won't.

I don't know that it will or won't.

As far as the 'one mistake' - the mistake is not in the phonics knowledge. He knows what sound 'ou' makes. The mistake was that he forgot to only use phonics, and tried to rationalise it.

Doesn't show a lack of phonics knowledge. Because he knows exactly what sound ou is.

in the same way my eldest has to be reminded sometimes to read the question in his KS2 Sats.

Actually I wouldn't agree that a child who is a really good reader does not need any phonics intervention ... some children may well need an intervention but the test would flag up a concern.

My main problem with it is that the schools teaching phonics really well; systematically with pace and passion and pedagogical understanding, are already assessing their children's phonic knowledge and skills. The schools who aren't teaching well, will not know what to do with the results of the screening. If they haven't taught well up until this point - then how will they magically implement effective intervention programmes?

and since the results won't be published ....

For this screening check to be worthwhile, it needs to be 'good enough'.

It needs to indicate to schools if their phonics teaching is not up to scratch and if some teachers are still using 'mixed methods' despite evidence to indicate that these fail 1 in 5 children.

This alone could help literally thousands of children who currently do not learn to read well to be taught to read better, by forcing teachers to use the best available method to teach reading.

Even in the school where phonics is taught well, it will pick up a significant proportion of those children who have difficulty decoding and where prompt intervention could prevent ongoing problems.

In this context, a few 'interesting false positives' in the form of able readers is neither here nor there. Even those false positives give indications of next steps in reading - if a child always approaches an unknown word expecting it to 'make sense' in terms of their existing vocabulary, then that limits their ability to acquire new 'real words' from their reading, and that would be worth addressing.

Just because the screening check is not perfect for all children (which actually in Lily's DS's case doesn't really happen - he will pass, as he achieves the pass mark, and his check throws up some interesting extra information about his reading approach - where is the problem?) does not mean it is not good enough for its main purpose for the vast majority of children.

That would be like me saying 'DS worked out the phonics code independently before starting school, so phonics does not need to be taught in school as able children can work it out independently' - I can see beyond the needs of my own child to the needs of the vast majority.