"So" is a sight word and can't be sounded out...

[Stampstamp]

Said the reception class teacher today. Aaargh! Thank heavens DD can already mostly read (she's nearly 5). Why do some teachers and schools have such a limited understanding of phonics, it seems so fundamental to me?

by Richard Krogh,
take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you,
On hiccough, thorough, lough and through?
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps?
Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird,
And dead: it's said like bed, not bead -
For goodness sake don't call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt).

Bingo.

As I say, these phonics threads pop up every year, and always seem to end with teachers arguing with each other and playing what seems to be a game of phonics tennis.

Would you think that the best thing to do as a parent is to try and mirror what they are being taught at their school, as long as it is not way off mark? I think trying to teach them differently could lead to confusion.

I think I'd clarify with the teacher what she said. I have been assured by my children that they have been taught something that sounded a bit odd; to find out that they had got the wrong end of the stick and the teacher was trying to convey a completely different message.

I was thinking more about the initial phonic sounds that the children would learn in YR. I am guessing thats what the teacher meant.

DS2 has just started Y1 and they learnt the basic phonic sounds plus a few more like ow, ou, ay (all variations) hearnt so, he, me etc as tricky words. Presumably they will cover the variations of o, e next?

But 'this is a correspondence we haven't yet learned' is a totally different message to 'this is a sight word (ridiculous) - it cannot be sounded out.'

I don't really believe there are incorrect methods if a child is an able reader and learns before school, the school should ensure they have a sound phonics knowledge once they start school. Sometimes a lack of phonics knowledge is masked by a good memory for words but a good teacher will deal with this.

DS1 could read properly before he was 4 and learnt the phonic sounds but probably remembered other words by sight. He still learnt the phonics sounds at school and they tested him when he started YR and he knew them all up to level 5 (I have no idea what that is). It hasn't really affected him at all as is still an advanced reader at 7.

Bully for your ds.

My ds was one of the 20% - yes, one in five children - who couldn't learn using mixed methods similar to the rubbish the teacher in the OP came out with.

Halfway through Y1 both his reading and his confidence were at total rock bottom. We binned the mixed/sight stuff that confused him completely and ordered phonics schemes from Reading Chest.

Time it took to teach him to read? Around 4 months. Time taken to pick his reading esteem of the floor? Still counting (he is in Y3 now).

Was that aimed at me? Not sure that was necessary, just trying to explain why I thought mixed methods were ok, no need to be nasty. The school didn't teach mixed methods, not really sure why you are getting at me. Why is me saying that any different than you saying it didn't work for you DS. Sorry, I am baffled by your attitude, I have seen you on here loads and always thought how helpful you have been etc!

Pointing out that mixed methods fail one in five children is just fact. I rose to your point that children who can read before they get to school will not be affected by the misconceptions taught in the OP - what, so sod the 20% who will? I am sure you didn't mean that, but that's how that point always comes across.

'this is a correspondence we haven't yet learned'

You keep saying that.

do, so, to, go. Explain the "sounding out".

In 'go' and 'so', the 'o' is an /oa/ sound (yo-yo, no, only)

In 'do' and 'to' it's an /oo/ sound (move, movie, prove)

Children can accept things like this very easily - visit a good phonics lesson and see it done.

In 'go' and 'so', the 'o' is an /oa/ sound, In 'do' and 'to' it's an /oo/ sound

Yes, obviously, once you know that. The point is, you have to know that in advance. How does teaching the case-by-case exceptions differ from "sight words"? I can sound out rough and bough, too, but I'd need to know in advance how they sound in order to do so. Which is the point about 'sight words', yes?

Sight words are learnt as a whole, with the premise that they 'cannot be sounded out' - which we know isn't true.

It isn't something which teachers are supposed to be teaching.

I wouldn't call them case-by-case exceptions, either - I gave you at least four examples for each.

because phonics is about learning what letter groups make what sounds, and then deciding which rule to apply (you can usually tell by if it sounds like a word you know)
that's why different rules are taught at different levels.

Friday16 when a child first encounters a word like 'no' they will be told that the 'o' makes 'oa'. When they then encounter the word 'go' they may at first read it as in 'god'. However, they quickly realise that it doesn't make sense so they can then recall an alternative pronounciation of 'o', try it out and correctly sound out the word. And repeat with so/ho etc. And so on with every word that they can't decode first time. They won't recall every single alternative at first, but with time they will get used to recalling and using the different variations.

Perhaps more importantly, if you tell a child that there are many words that 'can't be sounded out' you send the message that if you get stuck, you will probably have to ask an adult. If you tell children that all words can be sounded out, but some have tricky bits, then youare bbuilding independence. A child who always tries to sound out can work out a lot of words independently, even if they have the odd tricky part.

This thread has moved on since my last post! I'm glad some people understand my frustration, I just wanted to rant really as there's nothing in reality I can do about it - I don't think the school is going to update its phonics training for teachers on my say-so.

Just to clarify: The teacher saying that "so" can't be sounded out, was saying this in a whole class information session for parents about reading. It seemed clear in the context that she didn't mean "at this stage". I'm not worried that my DD isn't being taught sounds quickly enough, I'm frustrated that the teachers don't seem to understand phonics in any depth.

Bethany I teach DD as you describe - she tries the first sound she thinks of that matches the letter, and if it's the wrong one I remind her of the other sounds that letter can also make.

"do, so, to, go. Explain the "sounding out"." It's very simple friday

In English a single spelling such as can represent different sounds

In so & go the spelling represents the sound /oa/
in do & to the spelling represents the sound /oo/#in pot the spelling represents the sound /o/

children are taught to try the most common first then the alternatives ...they aren't taught that this word needs to be taught by sight because you can't sound it out (unless the teacher is clueless using mixed methods )

children are taught to try the most common first then the alternatives

So they try "do" with oo to rhyme with new and with oa to rhyme with low. They know that do, pronounced conventionally is a word (presumably). They also might know that doe, again pronounced conventionally, is a word, because they've seen The Sound of Music. How do they decide?

No they would try /o/ first as that is the most common then the others hopefully they would be able to decide that

Do you want an ice cream?
is D/oo/ not D/oa/

No they would try /o/ first as that is the most common

How would they know it's the most common?

Do you want an ice cream? is D/oo/ not D/oa/

So they'd use the context the world fits into? Hmm...the distaste being directed at "mixed methods" seems a little fierce when "phonics" is going to involve knowledge of the relative frequency of phonemes, always assuming that the vowel in do is more common than the vowel in so, which seems a pretty bald assertion. Checking your decoding by the syntactic plausibility in a sentence seems just like some of the "look and say" methods of yore, too.

How would they know it's the most common?

because they have been taught
Checking your decoding by the syntactic plausibility in a sentence seems just like some of the "look and say" methods of yore, too.

not at all the child works out the code they don't guess

I was told by our school that for reading they should be using a mixture of decoding, context (using the story and the pictures), and does the sentence make sense as read.

So your school teaches mixed methods despite government policy Growlithe

That's searchlights - mixed methods - and not what they are supposed to teach at all.