What reading schemes do your reception aged children use?

[lottieandmia]

Dd3 brings home 'Dandelion' books. I've never seen them before. Years ago dd2 learned to read with 'Jelly and Bean'.

So is ORT going out of fashion?

The old ORT books are based on look and say rather than phonics. So it;s difficult for children to read the early books as they can't sound out most all of the words.

Both Dandelion readers and Jelly and Bean are phonic based schemes though so should be easier for children to read in the early stages.

The new curriculum (from Sept 2014) requires schools to give children books that are within the level of their phonic knowledge so the older style ORT might disappear more quickly then.

A whole mixture... sometimes ORT, sometimes Roger Red-Hat, sometimes Ginn.

The phonics based books are much better IMO. I remember dd2 really struggled to learn to read with ORT and her school doesn't use it at all any more.

We mainly use Dandelion in reception

Ours use Read Write Inc. DD learnt very quickly, they has done the whole range by Easter if I remember correctly. She's now half way through Y1 and reading chapter books, as are many in her class.

DD used Jolly Phonics books in reception which are dire.

From yr1 they use Biff etc, songbirds, PM readers (for higher ability kids), blue/green/red bananas books.

Dandelion here.

Read Write Inc and Songbirds for YR and then in Year 1 DS is getting mostly ORT.

We have a variety of different schemes in YR. the 2 books my son got today were Storyworlds.

My dgs in Yr R rattled through the Dandelion books and is well on in Green Band ORT now though he seems to be able to read most things easily. I think the Dandelions are great confidence givers they start with cvc words then ccvc etc with games to practise sight words and real or pretend words at the end of each book. Dgs is actually enjoying The Magic Key books.

Ds has some modern phonics-based ORTs, including a bunch called X-Phonics which are actually quite good - Ant, Max, Cat and Tiger have magic watches which let them shrink to micro-size and have adventures that generally involve someone saying "I will get you".

Actually almost all his books seem to include the phrase "I will get you"...

complete mix. on the lower few levels more phonics ones and as they move up they use more of the older ones. a mix of songbirds phonics, read with biff chip and kipper phonics books, Spirals starters, ORT snapdragons, traditional ORT Biff Chip and Kipper, sunshine spirals, Rigby Star phonic ones that I can't remember what they were called, New Way, ORT glowworms etc.

DD's school use a mixture of ORT (Biff and Chip) and Collins Big Cat... I want some books like NotCitrus described, they sound way more fun than Biff and Chip.

DS stuck with ORT - all pre-2001.

It's tricky to explain what a typewriter is and why people in the stories have to go to a phonebox to make a call, etc when he's only 4!

I should get my arse on the school fund-raising team to get them organised to buy some new books.......

Seems to be a mix of songbirds, big cat Collins and ginn and probably others.