Phonics Test Year 1 Query

[NigellaEllaElla]

DS is doing the "Test" next week. I did a few flash card words with him last night and just have a query.

He sounds out the word but if it has a "y" at the end he sounds it as "yu" as in the letter name, not sound. (Not sure yu is best way of explaining it but can't think of alternative) rather than "ee" but then still says the word correctly.

So for "Happy" he might say "H a p p yu - Happy"

Because he is saying "yu" not "ee" when sounding will this count as a fail even though he knows the word correctly?

Bloody stupid test. He's a really good reader for his age, possibly a little too good cause I don't think it will do him any favours in a test like this!

Thanks in advance for your help.

Incedently I learnt to read before encountering the whole range of synthetic phonics teaching teaching. I was taught a set of rudimentary phonics but I remember sounding out words (also flash cards but I had to sound out unknown words).

I get what you're saying, Maizie, and yes of course there is a brain process going on however a child approaches a word, and yes of course the sounds of the letters are a clue. But if you take my username, Biscuits, a child using phonics will read the word as biskwits. My Ds (who is far from a genius, I might add!), will look at it and know there is a b and a s and a c and a t in it, and an i sound, and will think, hmmmm, where have I seen that word before? Oh yes, on the packet of digestives Mum has in the tin - it must say biscuits. I think there is something inherently flawed in trying to get children to 'read' nonsense words - it is antithetical to good reading strategies! Instead of looking at the sounds and striving for meaning, they have to apply a blanket set of rules to produce non-meaning. It's bonkers.

^ sorry incidentally (spelling also atrocious sometimes).

Biscuits Some of the best books have nonsense words in them...

Yes, daftdame, of course... but then their pronunciation is a matter of choice!

Oh, and daftdame, one might argue that 'atrocious' spelling (not that I'm saying yours is!!) is one unfortunate side-effect of learning to read using phonics....

I can't remember children being given nonsense words in order to learn to read before. My memory of Lewis Carroll is that we were easily able to read before being given his work. Children are used to hearing nonsense words/names but that's not the same as reading them.

^Not entirely. How do you say 'Jabberwocky'?

Also when reading Middle English once you realise phonic variations eg 'ynogh' 'yhad' and can read out loud, understanding is much easier.

Who is going to be reading Middle English?

Biscuits If you are talking about method, the way I was taught at school, would be described as mixed methods.

Bad spelling is probably my own peculiarity, I never could be bothered with it, until it really mattered (eg when I worked for a newspaper, yikes!)

Learnandsay Me. Love it.

Exactly, learnandsay. The whole purpose of reading is to derive meaning. If you divorce the meaning from the process it's just folly. And the 'nonsense' words in Lewis Carroll do mean something. If you are told to 'beware the jabberwock' you can infer that the jabberwock is probably an unpleasant and dangerous creature, because you understand 'beware'. However, the word 'igsplurt' by itself, can be PRONOUNCED by using phonics but it cannot be 'read', because 'reading' has to imply 'understanding'. Telling children that it doesn't matter whether or not they understand is DAFT DAFT DAFT!

I think a good phonics grounding will also help when learning languages in general. I found spoken Swedish made much more sense than written, then you learn the new phonic rules.

But the same phonics rules do not apply to all languages, even European ones. Take the letter 'j' in Spanish!

There are lots of levels of understanding going on in reading. Phonics helps you say the word.

Biscuit Spanish 'j' has a phonic rule, it is just different to ours. Once you learnt one set of phonic rules you can learn another set.

Well, yes exactly biscuits.

The test method contains an assumption (doubtless correct) that for the majority of children phonics is the best method of learning to read. And hurriedly the government wants to test how phonics is being delivered. And, in their infinite wisdom have decided that a test consisting of 50% made up words is the best way of achieving this. I can't see why they couldn't have chosen esoteric genuine words. The likelihood of very young children knowing most esoteric English words is very small.

Well our language does consist of letters not pictograms. Makes sense to me to know what sounds those letters represent. When I read I imagine those sounds. If reading an unfamiliar dialect, I actually find it easier so understand when I read aloud. The phonics helps me here because the words as seen are unfamiliar.

If the words were written in isolation and scattered around they would not have meaning. But if they're real words in context then often the meaning of a word can be derived from the meaning of the sentence that it's in. It's not always true. But it's often true. Depending on the age of a child she can then look the word up, which is how I was taught.

^ should be 'to understand'.

== they would not have meaning to an unfamiliar sight reader. (Of course they would literally have a meaning.)

learnandsay A shopping list has context, but since it is not written in sentences a unfamiliar ingredient might be difficult to ask for if you didn't have any phonics knowledge.

Sentences can also be one word long, eg. 'Wait!'

My Ds (who is far from a genius, I might add!), will look at it and know there is a b and a s and a c and a t in it, and an i sound, and will think, hmmmm, where have I seen that word before? Oh yes, on the packet of digestives Mum has in the tin - it must say biscuits.

You hope...

Of course, you might have a packet of Digestives like the one in my kitchen which doesn't actually have the word 'biscuit' on it.