Teaching phonics the wrong way......

[calzone]

Am being vague deliberately as have been outed in RL before.

4 form intake.
Year 1.
9 adults.
Phonics.
Each adult has been taking a different phonics group. Or 2 of us doubling up.
So 1 TA is teaching ph2,
1 TA, 1 teacher doing ph 3,
More doing 4, 5 and 6
One TA on 1to1 with SEN child.

Found out we are doing it wrong. (I knew it! But no one would listen.)

Have we got time to turn it around before the dreaded Phonics Test.

Apparently we should have been teaching Ph5 to all and jumping back over Ph3 4 and 5.

They need to know the phase 5a phonics which is about 4 weeks long so you've got time to cover this properly and reinforce it.

I would go straight on it with the phase 3/4 children, possibly doing a mock test after it to check for problems.

We find our problems are usually split digraphs, ue/ew, 3 letter strings and 2 syllable words

The phase 2 children could cover phase 3 and 4 at the same time.

What has the school done in the past? What are the phonic results like normally?

.

Phases were never intended to be a means of differentiating! Best practice is children all being taught the same correspondences with extension work for the fast learners and extra support/sessions for the slower learners. In fact, the phases should have been strang;led at birth; they're totally unnecessary and positively encourage misunderstandings!

So yes, you have been doing it 'wrong' but probably down to poor, or no, training rather than anyone's 'fault'.

I'd suggest that you have a look at the technical report published after the PSC Pilot in 2011 (report was in 2012) It explains just how the graphemes used were selected (it was based on the order of teaching of 6 SP programmes, not just L & S) which will give you an idea as to which are likely to be used.

My take on this would be to say:

Don't forget to get children of all ability levels reading a lot using the correspondences they have learned; getting decoding and blending really secure is half the battle; the other half is learning the correspondences to automaticity and the best way this is done is by using them. Cut out games which don't offer concentrated practice in these skills.

But I'm not EY/primary. Others might have more useful advice.

I do feel sorry for those children who are still doing phases 2 & 3.

Good luck...

Thank you.

As you would expect, the data is dire.

HT is furious.

I would start by assessing what sounds they know already and if they can aurally blend and segment cvc / cvcc/ cvcc words and use this to inform where to begin teaching. If children genuinely are still working at phase 2 (and those stupid phases have a lot to answer for) then it's no good rushing onto phase 5 as they will gave huge gaps in their phonic knowledge.

Find out what they can do and start there!

As MaiseD said the phases were never intended to be used for differentiation and certainly not as barriers to progress.
In order to decode the words in the phonics screening check children need to know the sounds taught in phases 2,3 & 5 and to be able to blend words up to ccvcc level and polysyllabic words.
If they haven't been taught this they are going to struggle.

Has anyone in the school received any quality phonics training or have you just been given a copy of Letters and Sounds and expected to get on with it?

Also agree games are an unnecessary distraction. Always teach new sounds within the context of words containing sounds already known never in isolation. They don't need flash cards and they don't need to spend hours practising for the check it isn't necessary and a waste of time when you have so much to cover.

Assume you have ?etters and Sounds assessment pack?

HT might well be furious but s/he is responsible over all.Surely should have known what was going on and have been looking at the data a good deal earlier than 2/3 way through the year!

She is a new Executive Interim HT so just discovering what is going on.

No quality training. Just a pack.

Was doing ph6 with my top group.
Now doing cvc words with base.

That seems totally insane!

30 children per class.

We know a few won't make it.

But sooooo many don't know split digraphs.

((Doesn't help that teacher calls them diagraphs!!))

Many children are so focused on learning how to play the game they fail to learn what the game us intended to teach. Learning can be fun without distracting games.

If teacher shows them ck they say split digraph but if you show them cake, they say cak.

Ck

Not coming out properly.

Why are they saying split digraph for Ck?

Yes most of my Y1s could tell you ten ways to represent the sound /ay/ fancyanamechange

That's why I asked the question. If they are saying split digraph fir Ck there is a problem.