Sight reading as a strategy in EYFS/KS1 - mrz?

[Guilianna]

What would you say to a SLT convinced that 'sight reading' is as effective a strategy as phonics, and who advocates teaching mixed methods?

[SweepTheHalls]

Somewhat off track, but can I just ask as a parent of a reception child..... I explain worlds like came, with magic e to change the a to an A when he sound sit out. What should I be doing?

[BeatriceBean]

I was just about to say the same!

My daughter has really flourished with phonics in reception... but I've said magic A or "A split E" I think they've learned.

Why shouldn't I say magic e - what should I say instead? I'm v keen to promote phonics alongside school :)

[MrsKCastle]

Ancient and forward both contain less common gpcs than ancestors and generations.

Mrz I have a huge amount of respect for you and your knowledge/promotion of phonics, but I do think Diamondage's questions are valid- how should parents deal with those rare gpcs? In an ideal world, teachers would be introducing them at an appropriate rate, but we all know that it doesn't always happen. In fact, despite the new regulations I'd say it's rare to find a school teaching complex code well.

With my DD I am continuing to do the incidental teaching thing- so if we see 'ancient' we might discuss how we say 'ay' rather than 'a'. We might talk about other words where we say 'ay'. And the same with 'ci' and 'sh'. But without having access to a list of English words with the same correspondance, it's hard to know how to really move DD on in her understanding.

[mrz]

There isn't anything magic about the "e" the spelling is but in this word it is separated by another sound.

We would explain that a long time ago came was spelt caem but someone decided it would be better as came.

[MrsKCastle]

SweeptheHalls and BeatriceBean the advice is to point to the 'a' and the 'e' and say something like: 'in this word, these two letters work together and make the sound 'ay'. So the word is c-ay-m- 'came'.

Then you could look at other words with the same spelling pattern.

[I have a feeling that we shouldn't be saying they 'make the sound' but I can't think of another simple alternative- 'these letters represent the sound 'ay'' maybe?]

[mrz]

Ancient and forward both contain less common gpcs than ancestors and generations.

sorry but I disagree MrsCastle

a common spelling of the sound /ae/ n /n/ ci /sh/ e /e/ n /n/ t /t/

f /f/ or /or/ w /w/ ar /?/ d /d/

[mrz]

We would say "are how we spell the sound"

[diamondage]

These are not regular spellings for the sounds they represent. If they were my DD wouldn't need support & yr 1 children who pass the phonics test would not need support to read these words correctly.

DD knows the 'ci' /sh/ correspondence - here we say ainchnt (literally) not ainshnt - is that how you say it?

I know of no other words apart from that group that use ar as a spelling for /oo/, I'm not saying there aren't any others but unless you can show me a list with more than 20 common words then it is objectively rare/irregular when compared to the many words where ar represents /ar/.

Thank you for you support MrsCastle.

Unfortunately mrz I am left thinking that you can't answer my questions (because if you can then why won't you?) and the way you deal with this is to invalidate my questions by telling me they are moot (i.e. that my definition of irregular or rare is the problem).

But telling me black is white is of no help to me OR my daughter.

[mrz]

Yes they are regular spellings for the sounds they represent ... if your daughter and children in Y1 haven't been taught them yet that is perhaps an issue for the school and yourself diamondage.

If your local accent pronounces ancient as "ainchnt" then the teacher should be teaching that the ci represents the sound /ch/ where we live (and drop in that other people say "ainshent" instead - my class are quite happy that the a in grass is /a/ in our accent but some people say "grarss") accent isn't an issue with phonics - the teacher teaches to the local accent.

I thought I was answering your questing by explaining how the sounds are represented in the words but perhaps that isn't what you want to hear?

[debbiehep]

It's good to see great questions being raised here. I found out about this thread via Twitter and thought I could contribute.

We need children to be both fearless and flexible when it comes to lifting the words off the page. We want them to know about the history of the English language leading to the many languages which have influenced our current language - and we want them to know once writing was invented, the mixture of languages and spelling systems led to the English language having the most complex alphabetic code in the world.

To this end, some of you may know already that I provide a varied range of Alphabetic Code Charts - free to download - to inform, train and support various people including parents and including for the learners themselves to understand and use.

Making good use of your preferred Alphabetic Code Chart - both in school and at home - can really support with the incidental phonics teaching which parents can contribute to hugely.

I also provide free posters with suggested 'patter' or 'language' for both reading and spelling purposes. You can take any word at all and for reading purposes, simply say, "In this word, these letters [or letter] are code for the /sh/ sound" (or whatever). So, supply the 'sound' and point out the code.

Once you get used to promoting phonics AS an alphabetic code - that you are teaching 'a code' or that the children 'are learning' the code - then it should go without saying that the teaching and learning is supported with explicit visual aids of 'the code' - hence my constant and heavy promotion of the use of Alphabetic Code Charts to underpin both our systematic synthetic phonics teaching and our incidental phonics teaching.

I go much further than this. I actually base on my fundamental guidance not on 'systematic synthetic phonics' alone, but on 'two-pronged systematic and incidental phonics teaching'.

I write about this via free pdfs which you can find on the 'Free Resources' page at Phonics International. This site also leads to other sites where I provide many free resources and much information - intended not only for the teaching profession but for parents as well.

After all, we're talking about teaching the parents' children.

It should be a shared aim - especially in something so very important as literacy basic skills which is truly life-chance stuff for some children.

So, I have read the comments on this thread and I have had a great deal of empathy with questions about 'pronunciation' when children are endeavouring to decode new and unknown words. The better they know about the history of the English alphabetic code - and that it is very complex and they will need lots of teaching and lots of help with words they don't know - for example, how to come up with an exact pronunciation (according to the region in some cases), then the more fearless and flexible our young learners will be.

They need to be comfortable with the idea that our code is tricky but that by teaching it well, they can have jolly good try at decoding and most words are basically straightforward - especially when underpinned by good spoken language.

If I am allowed to add links to a message, I'm happy to flag up the exact electronic links for the various posters and resources I've mentioned but I don't know what mumsnet allows.

Otherwise, if anyone has an interest in further phonics information - and the 'two-pronged' approach, you can find the resources via the Phonics International website.

All the best,

Debbie
X

[mrz]

MrsC the way parents and teachers should deal with unusual spellings for sounds is exactly the same as they would for any other spelling for a sound.

Last week I had an inspector in observing and I had asked my Y1 class to write down as many spellings for the sound /ae/ as they could. Some managed 4 or 5 but some knew 10 ways even one that applies to only one word in English ... they knew because they had been told. It's that simple.

If you need a list I recommend beckclasswiki.wikispaces.com/file/view/SpellRead+Lexicon.pdf although you can buy phonic dictionaries.

[Panzee]

Debbie Hep is ace, I remember her contributing to TES threads when I used to go on there. I have her free code chart, it's a great resource. I'm glad you're here Debbie, another voice of reason!

[SoundsWrite]

Just to take a few points from diamondage and a response to Guilianna:
The truth is that children's spoken vocabulary far, far exceeds their reading vocabulary until well into secondary school so it's not so common for a child to come across a word, decode it and for it not to trigger recognition.
However, it does happen, as it does for fully literate adults. So, what do you do if you happen across a word in, say, Scientific American, and you don't know how to pronounce it? You make an educated guess and then, if it's important to you, you look it up in a good dictionary, or online, or you ask someone how to say it.
With the word 'labyrinth', whether you say it as I do as lab uh rinth, or as you do as lab rinth doesn't matter. If it's already in your spoken vocabulary, you'll recognise it. On the other hand, if you want your pupil/child to be able to spell it, you split it into its syllables /l/ /a/ | /b/ /uh/ | /r/ /i/ /n/ /th/. The only difficulty now is the schwa or weak vowel sound frequently encountered in weak syllables of polysyllabic words like this. You tell the child that we spell the /uh/ like this . The you get them to write it sound by sound across the three syllables and read it back and ask them, if they had to spell the word tomorrow, what would be the difficult bit? And get them to focus on it. Actually, this spelling is really a bit of an anachronism. You'll see in Tyndale's version of the Bible that is a frequently spellyng for what has become in many modern spellings an . The other thing is that, because language is dynamic and pronunciation changes over time and with fashion, spelling can be a bit conservative and lag behind.
But, of course, you are quite right!: 'It just isn't possible to know from text alone'. That's because language is phonologically based: sounds (spoken language) come first and written language is a relatively recent invention. Furthermore, on account of accent differences, we will probably say all sorts of words slightly differently. That doesn't mean though that every single sound in every single word hasn't at some point been assigned a spelling.
Going back to the original question from Guilianna 'What would you say to a SLT convinced that 'sight reading' is as effective a strategy as phonics, and who advocates teaching mixed methods?' I'd say to the SLT that there is no scientific evidence to support their hypothesis. The scientific community is resolved that all the data converges on a consensus that teaching phonics results in significant gains in word recognition and spelling. and that teaching whole language is a 'very efficient way to generate large social class differences in reading achievement', to quote Keith Stanovich (from his essay 'Putting Children First by Putting Science First' in Progress in Understanding Reading: Scientific Foundations and New Frontiers.

[MrsKCastle]

Good to see the phonics experts on here. I've learned so much about phonics on Mumsnet over the years and it's doing my DD a huge service.

Debbie and mrz thanks for reminding me about the alphabetic code charts. I am trying to encourage DD to refer to one with her writing.

Soundswrite I'm sure children do have a larger spoken than reading vocabulary, but surely if they're reading at an appropriate level they'll be encountering unfamiliar words on an almost daily basis? Certainly DD1 (Y1) often meets new words, and we approach them exactly as you say.

[debbiehep]

Thank you for the appreciative comments.

We've come a very long way since years ago on TES. I remember when I attended local authority training for the National Literacy Strategy (as a class teacher) being told, 'Did you know that there are 40 or so sounds in our language - but don't worry - you don't really need to know them all'.

In the old TES days, phonics was not a given, we were fighting a corner to persuade teachers to use a systematic phonics approach and certainly government and Ofsted were not involved properly in this understanding at all.

Compare that to the mumsnet forum for parents, talking alongside programme authors and teachers, where we are discussing the intricacies of our complex English alphabetic code and how best to teach and learn it! I think it is fantastic!

Regarding words we provide children through a cumulative word bank, I don't worry too much about whether the words are within children's spoken vocabulary.

There are so many children nowadays who are attending our schools speaking various languages -and for whom English may be an additional or even new language - that it is impossible to provide words on the basis of whether or not they are in the spoken language of each learner.

However, once you have taught the children the letter/s-sound correspondences of those words, the point is that they can recognise the letters and letter groups, articulate them from left to right of the printed word - and 'discern' a 'word' and come up with a pronunciation.

In many words this pronunciation may be approximate - whether or not the child knows the word. If the word is commonly known to the child, then the child usually and pretty automatically tweaks, or modifies, the pronunciation of the word to the way he or she pronounces the word (which in itself does not guarantee a 'correct' pronunciation by an adult standard necessarily!).

As others have said, however, the alphabetic code knowledge and blending skill has enabled the child to discern a word probably close enough to be of value - to prompt the actual word, or to bring a 'new word' into spoken language. Of course such a word needs to be within a sentence if context is to help with 'meaning' - that is, deducing the meaning of any new and unknown words.

The beauty, also, of not worrying about whether all the children know all the words, is the acceptance of teachers that at least the children are learning the technical code knowledge and skills which will ultimately tune their ear into the English language and English articulation in circumstances when it is not the mother tongue or in circumstances when an English-speaking child is not articulate and has an impoverished spoken language anyway.

Further, by having such a bank of cumulative decodable words which may well not be within children's spoken language, it makes the children particularly adept and attentive to phonics application and the blending skill - and this is the equivalent of them practising with nonsense words. In other words, children do not need to practise blending with nonsense words when there are plenty of new and unknown words that they are practising routinely and with which they are expanding their vocabulary and language comprehension.

[debbiehep]

oops - or, like mrz mentions over and again - the teacher simply tells the child the meaning of the word - the teacher teaches.

So often the arguments around phonics seem to suggest that children are left entirely to their own devices to apply phonics knowledge and skills - phonics detractors pick holes (or try to) in the role of phonics by being awkward about particular words (for example, within this actual thread!) - but it is entirely relevant that a teacher is on hand to do some teaching and to support learners as required.

Yes, we have such a complex alphabetic code - and yes, there are many words which can cause frustration as they don't seem to fit a main or dominant pattern within the code - so parents and teachers must constantly be saying, "In this word, these letters are code for....." and provide the sound - and for spelling, "In those words, we spell that sound with this spelling alternative as in the word.....".

I encourage any parents to join in with these phrases which is why I provide the posters with the language and the alphabetic code charts. Not all parents will want to or feel able to - but over time we are all getting more and more knowledgeable about unpicking the complex code and how best to teach it!

[hiccupgirl]

I'm not going to join the debate above about phonics as the only effective way of teaching reading, writing, spelling in English.

What I will add from my teaching of children with various different SEN and working with SLTs is that it is not unusual for children who are struggling with their speech and language to find hearing and recalling phonic sounds very difficult and in these cases sight words can be a very effective way of getting them going with reading etc. There is also a wide range age when children become physically able to hear the separate sounds in a word like 'cat' - this can vary from under 2 to 7+. If a particular child cannot distinguish separate phonics sounds until around 7 they are going seriously struggle with a phonics only approach until that age. Some children with particular SEN are recognised as being unlikely to learn to read using a phonic only method and sight words, usually accompanied by a picture cue are more effective.

None of this means they shouldn't be included in phonics teaching but despite the new regulations, phonics only does not suit all children and I would guess this is why a SLT is looking at whole word recognition too.

[mrz]

As a SENCO I'm interested to know which particular SEN are recognised as being able to read using phonics only hiccupgirl?

[MrsKCastle]

Thanks again Debbie. The more you say, the more confident I feel about what I'm doing with my daughter. She's the only child I've taught to read from scratch, but (based on the sample of one) I'm very very impressed by phonics.

[SoundsWrite]

In answer to hiccupgirl (and in the spirit of trying to helpful and de-mythologise a couple of common illusions).
It is simply untrue to claim that children find hearing sounds difficult. We are primed for speech and babies in the womb during the last trimester of pregancy are able to differentiate speech sounds from non-speech sounds. When I'm told by teachers or anybody else that the children is having trouble with his/her sounds, I ask 'Can the child speak and understand ordinary language?' if they can, they can hear sounds; otherwise, they wouldn't be able to talk.
What young children do find difficult is trying to match and remember the correspondence between sounds and spellings. However, even here, with high quality phonics teaching, virtually all children can learn to match them AND remember them. When I refer to 'high quality phonics teaching', I'm not merely echoing a cliche. For example, if in word building, instead of using three-sound words beginning with non-continuants (such as /b/, /d/, /t/, etc.), you begin with sounds you can hang on to and stretch out (such as /s/, /m/, /w/, etc.), children can learn to segment sounds in words very easily and quickly.
As for the allegation that some children with SEN can't learn to read using phonics, the research doesn't support any such claim; in fact, to the contrary, the evidence indicates that there wouldn't be anything like the number of children with SEN if phonics was taught properly, and those who do have an SEN are shown to be helped considerably by high quality phonics teaching.
All children benefit from phonics teaching - as long as the person teaching understands clearly what the relationship between the sounds of our language and the spelling system is and how to teach from simple to complex - which is why I agree with virtually everything mrz and Debbie have said.

[hiccupgirl]

I didn't say some children could only learn through sight words not phonics or that children are not primed for language. Children still acquire the ability to distinguish individual phonemes during a wide age range. My DS is 4 1/2 - he is great at beginning sounds but ask him to put together a-t as at or to segment it and he can't yet do this. He couldn't identify initial sounds until nearly 4, other children can do this much earlier, others are later. This is despite me being a teacher who naturally makes sure he's being exposed to phonics!

But many children with Speech and language difficulties, particularly with their receptive language find distinguishing phonemes difficult which then has implications for a phonics only approach. If a child has a difficulty with both their receptive and expressive language production then they are likely to mishear phonemes as well as mispronounce them. This makes using phonics accurately very difficult and other strategies used along side are useful.

In terms of children who are likely to find phonics more difficult in my experience many children with Down's Syndrome, acquired dyslexia (often through brain injury) and some types of cerebral palsy can struggle because they do not hear the sounds accurately or they find the sounds very difficult to process due the way their brains are processing information.

I've worked with children with a range of different SEN for 7 years now and lack of progress in phonics and then reading and writing is a really common thing I come across with the children I see.

[mrz]

In terms of children who are likely to find phonics more difficult in my experience many children with Down's Syndrome You might like to look at www.phonics4free.org/mona-mcnee-biog

[hiccupgirl]

mrz you will notice I didn't say all children with Down's Syndrome or the other conditions I mentioned but many I have personally worked with. But thank you for the link anyway.

I appreciate I'm not singing from the accepted hymn sheet for this thread so will bow out.

[mrz]

You aren't singing from the evidence sheet hiccupgirl whether or not there is an accepted line on this thread which I don't believe there is

[CecilyP]

If seems 'evidence sheet' contradicts what hiccupgirl experiences day in, day out, in her working life. Perhaps she should be allowed to provide her own evidence. If children who literally cannot progress with phonics are in a tiny minority, it is quite possible that there was not a single child with this difficulty in the samples from which the accepted evidence was produced. This does not mean they don't exist.