Yr 1 report - informed me she failed phonics test.....

[sugarhoops]

But she was given expected and exceeding for all report areas and her main report gave no mention of failing the test (the phonics test result was on a separate piece of paper, included in her report pack).

I have to confess, I was a little alarmed at the fail in the phonics test (29/40). I've been told by the teacher at last parents eve a month ago that DD is in the top group for phonics, one of the top readers in the class and is excellent at literacy. I was surprised to see she failed the phonics test, but then was given expected and exceeding for all her report areas, with no mention of needing further phonics support.

Can you just have an off day? My Ds passed the test a few years back and was definitely further behind with reading and phonics compared to dd at this same stage of yr 1. I'm confused, and not sure what to do to support her so that she passes in yr2 retake.

The thing is Really that my brain doesn't care whether there's a picture of an alien there or not. It does all this stuff automatically for me without asking my conscious mind's permission I can see how a child who's not used to second-guessing her (usually-correct) brain would struggle to remember that the alien pic means she should literally sound out the word. For me, at age six I was no more consciously sounding out and context-checking every word than I was consciously placing one foot in front of another to walk, like a toddler does. It flows automatically like walking. I could see my six year old self "failing" this test despite a 14+ reading age and four years of reading experience.

A child that reads silt as slit all the way through a geography text because they know slit and not silt has a problem

That child has poor comprehension. It doesn't take long to realise "slit" doesn't make sense in that context.

And all that nonsense about 'good readers changing 'strom' into 'storm' and so failng the PSC is, a complete myth. Someone suggested it somewhere and it was taken up with enthusiasm by the anti phonics brigade and, as they are still a majority of teachers, it's taken hold. The NFER evaluations say it's absolutely not so.

RealHuman, perhaps I could refer you to Rafa's post at the top of this page.

I think the "auto-correct" function in reading would definitely apply when you're reading a passage.

But not when you're given a list of words to read, instructions to read exactly what is written, and a warning that some are novel words (explained as alien names, and with a little alien icon by them on the list).

I don't understand your point, maizie.

Any 6 year old child who changes new/nonsense words into known words, will have a problem as they develop their reading skills. If it is automatic 'correction' then it needs to be addressed so that they are trained to read accurately.

So many words are similar- silt/slit, silver/sliver, conservation/conversation, hover/hoover, eligible/illegible. To be a good reader, children need to know how to read these words.

Children are also writers and they need to be able to correct their own work. I have sat with children hundreds of times and watched them read 'the' as 'they' or 'There a' as 'There was a' because they know what it should say. They literally can't see the errors because they're not used to reading accurately. It holds back their writing skills, not just reading.

My point, RealHuman, is that you cannot equate a 6 y old child reader with an experienced adult reader.

That's very true maizie. I just disagree with the statement

it is a nonsense that 'good readers will change nonsense words into real ones'. Good readers read all words accurately

because in real-world reading environments, good readers read nonsense words as words they know all the time.

Are there many nonsense words in the real world? Excusing on MN, of course!

because in real-world reading environments, good readers read nonsense words as words they know all the time.

You're very presumtious there, aren't you? How do you know that is what good readers do? Have you personally surveyed each of the millions of competent readers in the world?

Nonsense words in the real word?

no of course not.

Except
Dr Seuss.
And Lewis Carrol
And Roald Dahl
And Harry Potter
And ...

Not forgetting of course technical science words - I came across a few with my DD1's GCSEs.

And of course all the words the child has never heard before they find them in print.

And of course the words they have heard, but don't recognise them in print because they are mis-reading them as something else, or can't work out the phonics.

I didn't say all good readers I know I am a good reader - at least by school literacy standards - and I know that many other good readers have similar experiences to mine (for example, with those memes that go around with jumbled words where only the first and last letter of each word are the same, which are read smoothly as the brain autocorrects the nonsense to known words). Why so hostile?

Most of the nonsense words people come across in the real world are misspelt common words. If the common word makes sense in that context, great, it was likely a typo and no time wasted.

Isn't the problem with citing Carroll, Seuss etc. as originators of nonsense, that they're doing it in stories in order to entertain? In the real world we use language to get our message across. So, it matters what I'm saying.

If I say, it's urgent, make sure the surgeon gets the sturgeon.

the meaning of the words matter regardless of the size of the reader's vocabulary. But, if the author says

then the minipans attacked and defeated the pollypops

as long as you enjoyed the story, it doesn't matter whether your knowledge pf minipans and pollypops is great or small. The purpose of the writer has been accomplished. Whereas, in the previous case, if the doctor doesn't get the fish, it hasn't.

So update from a chat with teacher this morning... She said completely nothing to worry about. She said DD was self correcting the alien words to make them real words....like we all do when we spot a misspelt word. DD apparently has no problem decoding at all and, like others have said above, she was using her reading strategies for the test rather than doing true decoding. Apparently she needs no further support in yr2.

Teacher also said that she disagrees with the timing of the test, for many children she feels it would be much more beneficial to take the test at the end of reception, when decoding is still be using much more regularly to read books.

So I feel reassured by both teacher and this thread.... Teacher is very experinced and considered one of the best in the school, so I will take her reassurance that no further support necessary. We will continue at home to read daily to each other (I confess its slipped slightly towards the end of term).

Thanks for all your v helpful responses

All the David Walliams books have "made up word alert" for each word. I suspect it was put like that to stop critics claiming he was leading his readers astray.

Oh, I just missed reading pages 2&3 where everyone said I do need to be worrying! Gut instinct says I don't....I genuinely don't think she has a problem with decoding. I think if there is any problem that has been highlighted, it's that she didn't really understand the test or follow the instructions correctly

I would be very worried if any of my class were making "alien"
words into familiar words ... Sorry know that's not what you want hear but it means the child is relying heavily on guesswork and not reading accurately.
The who purpose of including "alien" words is to identify those children who aren't able to decode accurately.
There are only four words per page and the teacher can tell the child every page "these words aren't real" ...

I think, according to the DfE statistics, you need to be worried, OP. Whether or not you translate that into fretting and biting finger nails is up to you, I think.

Do they put all the alien words on the same page? Can the teacher point to one page and say these words aren't real and another page and say, but, these ones are real?

Sorry to scatter post, I already know about the alien icon.

"Do they put all the alien words on the same page? Can the teacher point to one page and say these words aren't real and another page and say, but, these ones are real?"

No, the teacher must not say anything. But then again, they wouldn't need to, as each alien word has a little alien by it.

x-post

Fair enough, perhaps it'll all unravel in yr2 and I have trouble heading my way, but I find it quite hard to understand how DD, who is in top phonics, and one of the top readers of the class, will suddenly come across major problems in yr2 or further up the school.... Her teacher knows her best in terms of academic ability, and her teacher is very experinced, so I'm assuming she's seen this happen before and it genuinely doesn't worry her with my DD.

Im Unclear how a child can get so far up a reading ladder being unable to decode accurately? She Stage 8 / purple reading colour. Surely she can't have gotten there by pure guess work?!

The check is there to identify issues (that often become apparent in Y3) so they can be addressed early.