my child reads and write at top level, but her Phonics group is not!!!

[B4r4joon]

My daughter is a very bright child at Y1...she is reading and writing very well...however when it came to grouping them, she is not been located in the top group in Phonics, although she reads the same level and writes the same as those children on the top group. This is very confusing for her amd me, as I dont understand on what basis this happened. She can be at times shy and she observes her peers very well and learn from them as she is bi-lingual. In the gropu she is in now, the difference between the level she reads and the level of some other children is huge...perhaps 7 colour reading band!!!

This has affecte dmy childs confidence as she thinks she hasnt been good enough, or why she is reading the same book as her reading partner, and he/she is in another group. ALl confusing for me, I am gonna talk to the teacher tomorrow, and I dont know how to say it. i dont want to convey that I dont trust their judgment, but this is gonna hold my child back and crashes her confidence, as the groups are gonna stay the same until the end of teh year! Can I ask the teacher to move my child to the other group? Is Phonics the knowledge that they learn to apply to their writing and reading, so how can she read and write higher than her phonics knowledge? She is already reading sounds that she has not been officially taught, by working it out on herself....

I don't suppose there's any chance of you letting this go is there? Your child is in YEAR 1. She sounds capable and delightful and the best thing you can do is enthuse about what she is doing, not worry about her being held back. She's in YEAR 1. Putting their shoes on is still quite a step for some children and it will all turn out fine in the end.

I agree with Northern - the teacher has explained the grouping. Your daughter is doing well, and is getting a solid foundation in phonics.

TBH, if you want to do extra stuff at home, you are probably best reading lots, encouraging imaginary games, and making up silly songs.

It's a long journey. I have a Year 1 and a Year 4. Believe me, no one can remember now what groups children were in in Year 1. The children who are doing well are those with a thirst to learn, and can concentrate, even when there are distractions.

My eldest wasn't in the top group for phonics in Year 1, but made steady, solid progress. He is however now top of the class for literacy (teacher told me at the last parents evening as we were discussing extension work). This is because he enjoys it, not because he knew his phase 6 phonics by end of year 1.

Rigby star, pm plus, phonics bugs also occasionally Oxford reading tree. But majority is pmplus and Rigby star

I don't even know which group my DS is in in Y1. I don't know if they have ability groups or not. Ignorance is bliss sometimes . I don't think it matters, does it?

PM was originally an intervention scheme linked to Reading Recovery and very much a Look and Say programme ...rather than one supporting systematic phonics teaching.

Tgger I confess I hadn't a clue where my children were in primary school until my son's Y6 teacher said he was the most intelligent boy she had taught in 30+ years of teaching ...but even that's subjective.

I'm not a teacher, or any kind of expert.

However I'm not sure that children are strictly streamed into ability groups in Y1. Ours were loosely like that (although we never knew which was which).

In Y1 it might be that the teacher felt that your DD was quiet and would work better with this particular group of children.

My DS is in Y2 now and was moved out of top group because he spent the entire time chatting to his friend .

But actually, there's not that much difference and it's such a small part of their education.

I hope you work it out op

doesnt help lots state schools do it diffrenet ad use different programmes.

My dd found transition from reception to year 1 hard.
I dont think they grouped for recption but they grouped year 1/2+.

year 1 last year they introduded phonics test which all year 1 will do this year.

Prior to the test i was told dd was struggling with reading/phonics and she was intervention group blending sounds.

she got 36/40 so passed.

Then the phonics groups in year 2 were set 3with her class

passed test-largest group with teacher
just missed passing-with ta
failed badly-senco

but dd ended year 1 on low reading level of 3 ort
but nc level was 1b.

I was unhappy with year 1 when tried to query how and what goes on year 2teacher got really defensive and was awful.
dd was bottom group for maths and lirteracy yet as top for phonics.

we did lots work over summer and felt she had improved.
dd was worried about never catching up with freinds.
during summer term year 1 she knew what everyones reading level was and what box number really knocked her confidence.

we ended up moving after just term of year 2 as couldent work with teacher wasent satisfied what they were doing were right, they had no action plan worried she would fall behind.

new school is small phobics group is mixed year groups set on ability just 5groups from reception-year 6. theres year 2, 3 and 4 in dds group been told her phonics is good knows all her sounds. her readings improving and her maths uite gooduite opposite to old school so confused but dds confidence has grown .

I dont think its new school do not stream they have groups for

phonics
handwriting
guided reading
maths.

but i dont think its as obvious. competative and the groups are smaller, ta and teacher seems more nurturing and less formal than old school

I guess the school will be focussed so getting as many kids as possible to pass phonics test.

I agree in some differentiation but agree with mrz how do we ensure they gap between the ability cohorts does not widen.

In all fairness to old school the groups were fluid and prior to moving few weeks before she moved up a table for literacy but they were slow with reading levels giving her books that were too easy.

I dident want her to be top in class wanted her to achieve her potential which i doubted would happen so moved her she had bad year 1 dident want that to determine all her groups for next 5years.

I too loved her old school so wanted her to get in.
But it changed and just wanted to work as partners and the way they handled us and things they said were dismall.
Maybe if they had been nicer,more respectful we would have stayed. we even met with the head.

mam I don't see how a school can mix years R-6 for phonics. It must be obvious by Y3 that something is going seriously awry with phonics teaching at the school if most children haven't mastered sounds by Y3. It is also dreadful for the children's self-esteem - an 9 year old with Y2s - how do they feel? KS2 should be doing their own intervention rather than sending children to KS1 groups!

We do RWI and have 8 groups running within KS1. In Y3 they do the RWI comprehension and use Freshstart as an intervention programme higher in the school. Children still experiencing problems will have pre-learning, and additional literacy support in KS2.

After 2 1/2 years of RWI, we are noticing a massive improvement in reading levels year on year, with the less able children now reaping the benefit of the programme in the early years. (There are other problems that arise in RWI and it's certainly not perfect, but it does what it says on the box for reading!)

alcofrolic its very small school and i gather the gaps are not as extreme so year 6/5would mostly be in top group.

bottom group would be reception/year 1.

not sure id my dd in group 2 or 3 from bottom shes year 2 said mostly year/3 in her group maybe 1/2year 4.

its mixed classes for every year apart from reception.

I thourght read/write was good for ks1 but not so good for ks2 unless used as an intervention.

But why would children in year 3-6 need to be doing phonics? At the end of Y2 we may end up with about 5 or 6 children out of 60 (generally SEN and EAL) who need phonics intervention in Y3.

There is no way that upper KS2 children should be needing phonics lessons. What is going on?

ask the secondary staff who are having to begin teaching phonics to children in Y7

And why is that happening? Poor phonics teaching in primary schools?

I dont know assumed normal was told by head all kids from year r -year 6 do their sounds together in ability groups.

I can only speak for my dd whos nearly 7 and rightfully so doing sounds all I can assume maybe is maybe its other elemenst of litercay at upper keystage not purly phonics.

it gets good sats results for english/literacy so dont think has huge problems.

Yes 7 years on from the Rose review some schools still aren't teaching phonics well.

Yes, but we don't know how many children are having to be taught phonics in Y7. We don't know whether they are having to learn basic phonics or some of the more involved features. And we don't know which children are having to learn phonics in Y7. It would be good to know all of these things.

ask those like maizeD who are picking up the pieces learnandsay

Yes, but we don't know how many children are having to be taught phonics in Y7.

I can only speak for my school but we get up to 20% of our Y7 intake with poor reading skills (percentage varies year by year). I would not say that many of them need to be 'taught phonics' in that they have to start from scratch (though I gather from other forums that this could be the case in some urban secondaries) but a significant number have big gaps in their phonic (i.e. letter/sound correspondence) knowledge, which have to be filled, and are unable to sound out and blend multi-syllable words (or even unfamiliar single syllable words). Some are very skilled at guessing words from pictures and some are just very skilled at guessing; guessing words which have nothing whatsoever to do with the text or the letters on the page in front of them!

Where the 'phonics teaching' is essential is in the practise of decoding and blending for reading; these children cannot read competently without this skill and no other strategies are of any use to them.

If they hadn't had incomplete letter/sound correspondence teaching, plus a 'mix of strategies' for word ID, in primary school they wouldn't need it now. Most of them have absolutely no 'conditions' which retard their learning.

That's the point I was trying to make, mrz. I think mam should be a little concerned that the school is still teaching 'phonics' in year 6. It implies something is going wrong in the early years and KS1.

20% poor reading skills in Y7? Doesn't that mean that the long tail of underachievement is alive, well and undented?

I'm not in favour of streaming for phonics alcofrolic and can't think of any benefit to a Y6 to be working with Y1 but lots of harm to a child's self esteem

Some are very skilled at guessing words from pictures

I'd never hear of eleven year olds reading picture books before. These children show no signs of SEN? Are they native English speakers in the main?

It sounds as though they come from a community which has low academic expectations. Would that be a fair guess?

I'm afraid not learnandsay

That's the reason for the level 4 expectation at Y6 I think. To ensure said 11 year olds can access the curriculum at secondary school. I'm guessing this 20% are those that haven't achieved this level for whatever reason (not knowing about levels, presuming level 4 is high enough .

If anyone read the Evening Standard today it had an article about a school that went from near the bottom of the literacy tables in London to near the top, due to a real drive by the school and the Evening Standard campaign to drive literacy standards up. Interesting reading. They had an army of volunteers who went in to listen to the children read, and also the school planned trips out to give children a breadth of life experience to make their writing richer.

Are you seeing the same patterns as Maizied, mrz? The description of an eleven or twelve year old struggling to read a picture book doesn't sound like a person from a bookish household. (I know that my sister never learned to read and she came from an incredibly bookish household.) But I've always thought that she was a bit of a one off, (and that my parents were a bit odd.) But, just to be on the safe side, I'm teaching my daughters to read myself.

I have parents evening tommorow can raise actual question then im intrigued but not overly worried theres only 20kids per year..

I saw tv programme about secondried teaching kids phonics how to read and phonics in year 7 so it must happen.

I guess phonics has become more commonplace last few years.so next few year 7intake be better maybe.