Most parents find phonics confusing, as do many teachers, because phonics no longer means just learning the main sounds for the most used English spellings, but the teaching of alternative sounds as well.
Whereas previously phonics meant merely learning to decode words with regular spellings, now it can also include what used to be called ?learning to read tricky words?, such as ?one, once, only?, and even learning to spell a sound in different ways (see, me, tea).
It all stems from the inconsistencies of English spelling which make learning to read and write English more complex than in other European languages where all spellings have at least just one pronunciation; learning to spell is quite tricky in some of them too. Because teaching children to read and write English is quite difficult, there are recurring disputes among teachers how best to do it.
English has 43/44 speech sounds, depending on accent (e.g. saw /sore end with the same sound for some). The most used spellings for those 43/44 sounds are the following:
/a/ - |cat|,
/a-e/ - |plate, plain, play|,
/ar/ - |car|,
/air/ - |care|,
/au/ - |sauce, saw|,
/b/ - |bed|,
/ch/ - |chat, catch|,
/d/ - |dog|,
/e/ - |end|,
/ee/ - |eat, funny|,
/er/ -|herb|,
/f/ - |fish|,
/g/ - |garden|,
/h/ - |house|,
/i/ - |ink|,
/i -e/ -|bite, by|,
/j/ - |jug, bridge, oblige|,
/k/ - |cat/ot/ut, pick, kite/kept, quick, fix|,
/l/ - |lips|,
/m/ - |man|,
/n/ - |nose|,
/ng/ - |ring|,
/o/ - |on, want, quarrel|,
/o-e/ -|bone, so|,
/oi/ - |coin, toy|,
/oo/ -|food|,
/oo/ -|good|,
/or/ - |order, more|,
/ou/ -|out, now|,
/p/ - |pin|,
/r/ - |rug|,
/s/ - |sun, face|,
/sh/ -|shop, station, musician|,
/t/ - |tap, delicate|,
/th/ - |this|
/th/ - |thing|,
/u/ - |up|,
/u -e/ -|cube, cue|,
/v/ - |van, have|,
/w/ -|wind|,
/y -/ - |yes|,
/z/ - |zip, wise|,
/zh/ - |vision, treasure|
I hope this helps a little.
Masha Bell