Advice from phonics experts please

[phonicsgovernor]

I am a school governor with a (second) child in reception. Over the past couple of weeks we have had ORT books home that were not fully decodable. They are still in the single letter sound stages of teaching phonics but the books included the words bike, look and dinosaur.

Now, my child is fine - I can access other materials for him. But the school serves quite a deprived area, with higher levels of FSM, SEN, EAL and MENA children. And I'm wondering if there will be children who are not fine.

I spoke to the head of KS1, who is excellent and lovely, and she couldn't see the problem with the odd word not being decodable. So - is it a problem, and if it is, how should I tackle it?

zebedee,

Can you link me to these RRF 'disagreements' about how SP should be taught, please.

From the thread that links to this one, is just one example. Giving advice to paper mover -

'You may find this short clip of a Direct Instruction/Reading Mastery phonics lesson showing effective teachers using an effective programme, correcting errors immediately and explaining why. The same technique is used when teaching spelling. This is how to teach getting it right in the first place.

Reading Mastery Training Series Pt.3c: Anatomy of a Reading Classroom

'

later

'... flagged up this Reading Mastery video but I have to say that this looks pretty awful stuff to me - and I think it is no wonder that phonics will get a bad name when this is viewed.

I do realise that I'm seeing it as an English person rather than American so some things will naturally not sit so comfortably - but in terms of the phonics and the practice this is pretty awful.'

And? Any more?

Have you read through the hundreds of threads on the message board or are you just making a snap judgement?

Here is another example -

rrf.org.uk/messageforum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=4736&start=30
p3 a discussion of the non-words used in the phonics check
p4 sounds-write vs. letters and sounds
p5
p6-7 disagreement over what is 'common-sense' in teaching of reading/extent that it is or is not 'rocket-science'
p7-8 the role of SP teaching in KS2
p9 the existence of the phonics check, the age it is administered and the use of non-words
p9-10 the age at which children should be taught to read and the role of parents

and yes I probably have read hundreds of RRF threads! (so no, not a snap judgement.)

Bearing in mind that you stated that there was disagreement on the RRF board about the way SP is taught.

p3 a discussion of the non-words used in the phonics check

I think you have a different definition of disagreement from me. Comments on the words don't constitute disagreement. Besides which, SP does not require the teaching of nonsense words so this has nothing to do with how SP is taught.

p4 sounds-write vs. letters and sounds
A slight criticism of the L & S programme's 'assessment, not of its teaching methods

p5

Where? What is the 'disagreement' about. I don't see any criticism of teaching methods.

p6-7 disagreement over what is 'common-sense' in teaching of reading/extent that it is or is not 'rocket-science'

Yes, certainly disagreement, but is it about how SP should be taught or is it about how much expertise is needed to teach SP?

p7-8 the role of SP teaching in KS2
Still not about how, but for how long. And, blink and you'll miss it.

p9 the existence of the phonics check, the age it is administered and the use of non-words
Ah. there is a good (and quite sad) reason for that one and I can't say more about it.

p9-10 the age at which children should be taught to read and the role of parents

Still no disagreement about how, only when.

You can hardly expect a discussion to consist of people agreeing with each other all the time, even if they are, on the whole, quite like minded. I would reiterate that most of the posters on the RRF board are in broad agreement about the principles of SP teaching, which do not vary in the most well known programmes. Yes, there may be some disagreement about details of how these principles are implemented, but how is one able to improve practice without an interplay of ideas and discussing how evidence can be interpreted and used?

You should also remember that the message board members are a cross section so have different perspectives. They don't always mesh. A bit like mumsnet really.

Maizie
The principles of phonics as set out on rrf site are a pretty vague and fluid thing and it would be difficult to find many teachers who disagree with them, except for

Do not teach or encourage guessing/predicting words ... from picture, context or initial letter cues (sometimes known as ‘multi-cueing’ or a ‘range of reading strategies')
which is blithely lumped together with
Do not teach or encourage guessing/predicting words from their shape, or from picture, context ....

Nobody with half a brain would dream of teaching reading by encouraging guessing words from their shape.

Lumping 'guessing/predicting' together is also a nasty little trick. - They are remotely the same thing. It's the constant denigrating of all other teachers that is the nastiest side of SP evangelists.
It is perfectly reasonable to encourage children to use picture or context clues to get at a word they are stuck on on.

And how, except by looking carefully at initial letters, can a child differentiate between 'tough, cough, through'?

www.rrf.org.uk/pdf/Final_03__The_Synthetic_Phonics_Teaching_Principles%2011-2-10.pdf

1. Teach the relationship between sounds and letters by systematically and comprehensively introducing the letter/s-sound correspondences of the English alphabetic code (e.g. between three and five correspondences per week at first, including vowels and consonants). Start with mainly one spelling for each of the 42+ sounds (phonemes) identifiable in English speech before broadening out to focus on further spelling and pronunciation variations.

Model how to put the letter/s-sound correspondences introduced (the
alphabetic code knowledge) to immediate use teaching the three skills of:

1. Reading/decoding - Synthesize (sound out and blend) all-through-the-spoken-word to to ‘hear’ the target word. Modify the pronunciation of the word where necessary.

1. Spelling/encoding. - Orally segment (split up) all-through-the-spoken-word to identify the single sounds (phonemes) and know which letters and letter groups (graphemes) are code for the identified sounds.

1. Handwriting. – Write the lower case, then the upper case, letters of the alphabet correctly. Hold the writing implement with the tripod pencil grip.

Provide regular dictation exercises from letter level to text level (as
appropriate.

Provide cumulative, decodable words, sentences and texts which match the level of alphabetic code knowledge and blending skills taught to date, when asking the learner to read independently.

Emphasise letter sounds at first and not letter names. (Learn letter names in the first instance by chanting the alphabet or singing an alphabet song.)

Do not teach an initial sight vocabulary where learners are expected to
memorise words as whole shapes.

Do not teach or encourage guessing/predicting words from their shape, or from picture, context or initial letter cues (sometimes known as ‘multi-cueing’ or a ‘range of reading strategies')

Introduce useful, common ‘tricky words’ slowly and systematically
emphasising the blending skill once the tricky letter or letters have been pointed out. For example, when teaching the word ‘you’, say, “In this word (pointing at ‘you’), these letters (pointing at ‘ou’), are code for /oo/.” (‘Tricky words’ are a small number of words, in which there are rare/unusual graphemes, or, words in which not all the graphemes have yet been formally taught, which might be used in early reading material.

Teach according to a planned and structured phonics progression – but also teach incidental phonics as the need arises.

Note: This teaching approach is set within a literacy-rich environment and requires a full range of further age-appropriate communication, language and literacy activities and creative opportunities.

Synthetic phonics teaching is generally at the level of the ‘phoneme’ (single sound) and not onset and rime (e.g. tr-ick, fl-ap) or consonant clusters (e.g. bl, sp, scr, -nd, - mp, -st) or word families (e.g. cake, make, take, flake).

The complexities of the English Alphabetic Code:

1. One, two, three or four letters can represent one phoneme (e.g. s, ph, air, eigh).

1. Most phonemes can be represented by different graphemes (e.g. /oa/: o, oa, ow, o-e, eau, ough).

1. Some graphemes can represent more than one phoneme (e.g. ‘ough’: /oa/ though, /u/ borough, /ou/ plough, /or/ thought, /oo/ through)

Nobody with half a brain would dream of teaching reading by encouraging guessing words from their shape.

I agree. Unfortunately, there are teachers - some of whom post on MN - advocating exactly that.

It's the constant denigrating of all other teachers that is the nastiest side of SP evangelists.

Loving the way you make it sound like a soap opera, Masha! There is no 'denigrating' - only the wish that all children could be taught to learn to read.

Nobody with half a brain would dream of teaching reading by encouraging guessing words from their shape.

REALLY, marsha?

As it happens, I have a positive archive of programmes for teaching and remediating reading from the 1970s on and word shape is a 'recognition' strategy taught by some. When I first started working with struggling readers the programme used by the SEN teacher at the time had word shape as one of its recognition strategies. What is more, I have seen references to using word shape for word ID on places like the SENCo Forum and TES over the past few years.

Problem is, marsha, that you have no idea about how reading has been taught over the years because it wasn't in your remit as a Secondary teacher or as a campaigner for spelling reform. You've only started involving yourself since the advent of SP threatened the validity of your argument about the 'difficulty' of learning to read and write English.

Googling 'using word shapes for reading ' gets a few pages of results. Read them, marsha, HERE

I agree that no-one in their right minds would teach the use of word shapes for word ID but...

Thanks for posting the principles of SP teaching, BTW. I didn't want to bore anyone with them, having given a link, but you never have such scruples

zebedee also seems to assume everyone posting on the RRF are supporters of SSP teaching ... I'm not sure that is true.

as for word shapes a reception teacher posting on Twitter last week said that was one of the strategies he taught.

I'm not sure that is true.

He he, not with thumbie at large

I'm not a member of rrf but it seems zebedee is a frequent visitor

Everyone's free to visit!

Not to misinform, though.

I'm still waiting for Andrew Davis

good luck with that! Oddly enough his colleagues David Waugh & Angela Carss have co written a book on teaching synthetic phonics for primary teaching students and are very open to learning more.

Come to think of it,
the shape of a word generally tells you whether a word is long or short. So the idea is not as utterly daft as i first thought.

But as with everything in English, there are exceptions:
thought, though, cough, through, height...

so the shape of he and be help you to read the word masha? does the shape help you to know if the word is fly from shy or train or brain?

Maizie
Googling 'using word shapes for reading ' gets a few pages of results.
I did and clicked on one at random and happened to find a very sensible one on speed reading (see below) which is, of course, not at all the same thing as teaching beginners to read. The stages we go through on the way to becoming fluent readers are not identical. Phonics is useful only at the very beginning. We move from that to instant recognition of all common words as wholes, and some children get there much faster than others.

How Recognizing the Shapes of Words Aids Speed Reading
By Richard Sutz and Peter Weverka from Speed Reading For Dummies
Speed reading up to 16 words at a glance is possible because when you read most words, you don’t see the letters in the words or the words per se. What you see on the page are shapes or images that you recognize from your past reading experience — that is, the words are in your vocabulary.

The only time you actually see a word and examine all its letters is the first few times you encounter it. You have to examine the letters closely and commit the word to memory. After it becomes a part of your vocabulary, you can recognize its shape. You can identify and process it quickly as part of a clump in the course of your reading.

In 1976, Graham Rawlinson, a researcher at Nottingham University, conducted an experiment to uncover what information readers get from letters and words when reading. He had volunteers read sentences in which the letters in the words were jumbled except for the first and last letters.

What Rawlinson discovered was surprising: People could read and comprehend the jumbled words almost as easily as unjumbled words. The experiment showed, Rawlinson wrote in New Scientist magazine, “that randomising letters in the middle of words had little or no effect on the ability of skilled readers to understand the text.”

Try this experiment yourself. Read the following paragraphs at normal speed. See whether you can understand the words as easily as you can understand words that aren’t jumbled.

Rseaerch icntidaes taht the oerdr of the ltteers in a wrod dnsoe’t mettar. Waht relaly mtteras is the frist and lsat leettr in the wrod. If tehy are in the rhgit palce, you can raed the wdors.
Wehn you raed, you dno’t raed evrey leettr in ecah wrod. You look at the wrod as a wlohe.
If you’re a typical reader, you were you able to read the paragraphs without any trouble. This experiment suggests that

•You read words as a whole when you read, not letter by letter.

•The first and last letter of a word may be the most important letters for recognizing a word because these letters define the word’s shape more than the others, and word shapes matter in reading.

•Context plays a role in reading. The words on either side of a word provide meaning to the word, and you can often tell what a word means by reading the words beside it.

•If a word is familiar to you, you’re capable of recognizing it even if it’s misspelled.

This example shows you that to some degree, reading words is just recognizing shapes.

Word jumble hoax debunked
blogs.msdn.com/b/fontblog/archive/2006/05/09/594050.aspx

www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/people/matt.davis/Cmabrigde/

He he

Raeding Wrods With Jubmled Lettres There Is a Cost
pss.sagepub.com/content/17/3/192.extract

Oh dear, you would think a "linguistic expert" would check her sources before posting drivel

Raeding Wrods With Jubmled Lettres

I had no trouble reading those. I did not even see immediately that they were jumbled!

But perhaps i am more used to seeing English spelt differently because i have studied umpteen early English texts with their different spellings?

Well Done Masha ... however obviously struggled with the linked research

spanieleyes - what sources did mashabell need to check?

www.nextstepassociates.co.uk/about-us/people/graham-rawlinson/

From how I understand it, the only part of the 'hoax' is that it refers to research at Cambridge University when it may have been based on Rawlinson's genuine 1976 phd thesis for Nottingham University.

The 'cost' is of time taken to read variations in mixing up the letters. (The 'hoax' does not even refer to speed taken to read it, just that people have the ability to, but researchers took the idea further). As an aside, de-coding also 'costs'.

So masha is using sources that refer to genuine research.