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.

Well, the experienced teachers on here could also offer you kind, reassuring advice but wouldn't you prefer honesty? A score of 29 on the phonics screening is a worry, a good reader should be able to decode more accurately than that. You need to find out which phonemes she was unsure of and work on those over the holiday as the school seems lacking in enthusiasm to identify and rectify any areas of uncertainty.

I think she'd have been capable of much more. She has a borderline expressive/receptive language issue as well. The school were trying to keep her phonics, comprehension and fluency together. I'm not sure how successful that actually was. There was such a discrepancy between those skills I don't think a traditional model of levelled books really worked.

The reception dealt with it by keeping her at stage 1+/ 2 ORT to match her comprehension, which was ridiculous. The year 1 teacher immediately jumped her to stage 6 ORT and orange level collins big cat but the odd word she came across was so far beyond her decoding abilities it didn't really help.

Sugar

I'm just a parent, but broadly I agree with the teachers.

However, because the screening check is in place, you now have knowledge that your DD isn't maybe using phonics strategies appropriately and consistently in her reading, and you have a good chance to intervene before it causes a difficulty.

If she knows her phonics but isn't using it, then you have a straightforward way to proceed.

All you need to do, is to continue listening to her read regularly, and pull her up every single time she guesses a word and tell her to use her phonics, (or sound it out), don't guess.

Read a variety of books, not just the ORT scheme, so she will come across unfamiliar words and need to practicing the sounding out.

Then continue to listen to her read throughout y2, even if you think she can read fine. Keep reinforcing the need to sound out not guess.

I think reading out loud encourages children to slow down a bit and not get too much into a habit of skimming/guessing harder words.

My DD2 is just finishing y5 and I still listen to her read out loud around 3 times a week. It helps me check she understands what she is reading, and improves her expression etc etc.

The constructive advice is that your child needs extra support with phonics because they didn't reach the minimum score required on the screening check.
You of course are free to ignore that advice

I'm not sure it's a case of grapheme knowledge, spaniel. I suspect it is more applying phonic knowledge. Something is not right though and I do think it needs getting to the bottom of and dealing with.

Level 8 is not useless at all, but you asked whether it was possible to get to that stage with just guessing and sight vocab. Itis, and it's a recognised problem. It's the children this happens to that are exactly the children the screening check is designed to identify.

She hasn't failed a crucial part of year 1. It's just that a part of the jigsaw is missing and you need to identify exaxctly what that piece is. In the long run, she will be a much better reader for it.

Don't panic sugarhoops. All you need to do is watch out when your DD is reading and make sure she does sound out any words she doesn't know. I found it helped DS to stop and write it down on a piece of paper and underline the sounds (or even better get DS to). Make guessing cost them some time and reinforce sounding out as a strategy!

I do think it is easy for them to slip out of decoding and I don't think it means anyone's done anything radically wrong. I saw DS do it and wondered about his teaching at school - but DD has done it too and she's learned at home with phonics all the way. They get a bit too used to recognising all the words at sight and and try to "remember" (i.e. guess) the next word they haven't actually seen before, they get away with it a few times and think they're saving themselves some trouble.

The fact she's got a bit lazy about decoding does not take anything away from your DD learning to read, the fact she has got large numbers of words automatic, the fact she is reading and enjoying stories. And if she learned via phonics in the first place it won't be hard to dig that ability out again. The fact that other kids can get to that point and beyond without phonics doesn't take anything away from her either - she'll be able to fall back on her phonics and go further, they won't.

Continue to use phonics play throughout the holidays, there are also some good letts workbooks - spelling and phonics which I found useful.

I don't think working by memory is all bad, in fact it can make you work faster. But at this stage I think a balance of phonics and memory is needed. Also, its possible she had an off day - was the teacher surprised? My son's (yr 1) quality of work varies day by day - often with his moods :)

Enjoy the summer holidays and try to enjoy some down time!

Thanks all. Yes teacher said she was surprised....said she knows she's capable so was really surprised when she came back to the classroom with a fail. Which also makes me realise that her class teacher didn't do the test with her (is this normal?). They had a trainee teacher for several months, surely she wouldn't have administered the test would she? I'm not sure what protocol is for who administers the test.

The check should be administered by a teacher known to the children. Personally I wouldn't allow a student teacher to administer the check unless I was totally confident in their knowledge of phonics and the class (IMHE students aren't confident with phonics but this might not be the same in other areas).

The children learn their sounds all year ... you can find them online. A lot of children dont look for the sounds and try to spell them letter by letter. ... look at ea all ie etc this is what you need to point out to DD when reading.

You can take or leave phonics. Lots of English isn't particularly regular phonetically, anyway, especially the foreign loan words, which we don't Anglicize, cello, vermicelli and so on. And why do we pronounce lieutenant the way we do? I'm still holding out for a rightenant, personally. As long as you pay attention to the details, practise and read lots, you can put phonics in the bin. It just makes some people feel happy and all power to their elbow. Doubtless your teacher is right. There's more to life than phonics, much more.

Good luck.

m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=oNkiatQo-pQ

I would hope not, but it is possible. It could have been the literacy co-ordinator, ks1 leader or SENCO though.

I still think I would do the phonics play games with her, making sure that she does blend every word. This should also help to give you an idea whether there are any gaps in her phonic knowledge. I would also encourage her/reward her for using blending as the first approach when she meets new words in her reading.

Since you say she used to blend unfamiliar words, she should have the basic skills but needs to get back into the mindset of using them. If you find she's coming across words that she doesn't know all of the phonics for, point to the relevant letters, tell her the sound by saying like 'this is /ee/, /ar/' etc, and then get her to blend the word as she normally would. Letters and sounds only teaches about 125-130 letter/sound correspondences. It might be that even if she knows everything she's been taught that she has enough gaps that decoding the sorts of unfamiliar words she's meeting in her reading is difficult so she's falling back on guessing.

It's possible that she's fallen into the habit of guessing unfamiliar words because that's how ORT books were written so as others have said it's probably just a matter of reinforcing decoding as the most effective strategy for new words ...

I suspect she's got a bit lazy with it....she can blend & decode but is seemingly out of practice. We will spend the summer doing phonics play games and using hers phonics pack she was issued at the beginning of school (oh and having fun too, I'm not planning on locking her inside until she can pass the test!)

And there was me buying her a mental maths book for the summer because I thought maths was the one area she could do with developing....she got exceeding expectations in maths

I'm still wondering how us non-phonics kids developed our reading skills without having learnt the phonics way....I'm an avid reader and good speller. How on earth did I manage it all, without never having to decode or blend?!?

"I'm still wondering how us non-phonics kids developed our reading skills without having learnt the phonics way....I'm an avid reader and good speller. How on earth did I manage it all, without never having to decode or blend?!?"

Essentially, most who came out able to read had assimilated the phonics code without being taught it. So slower, generally, and much more demanding of the pupil; and dependent of much sight learning by rote ('barking at print'). And illiteracy rates were high.

Phonics isn't strange to those of us a bit older - it was in use in a lot of schools right up until the 1960s (and in some, it was never abandoned).

Of course, parents of the generation expected to cope without the phonics code may have been taught it themselves, and so may have been fixing some of it themselves (c-a-t is cat) or choosing books like Dr Seuss to read with their children.

Lots of children will teach themselves the code however you teach reading. They will notice the link between sounds and the letters on the page and build up the code themselves as they read more. These children tend to do well out of the education system so there is a bit of selection bias when people say the weren't taught phonics but did well. It isn't really these children we worry about.

But there are also children who will end up functionally literate and able to manage everyday texts but will struggle with more complex academic texts when there is no adult to tell them what unfamiliar words actually say. Then there are children that struggle totally. It's these second two groups that benefit from explicit systematic phonics teaching and plenty of practice.

YY to having lots of fun. You don't need to do loads. 10 mins or so a day will probably be fine.

And these tests arent pass or fail, they are an assessment so the new teacher has a starting off point next year.

No they are to identify those children who will need additional support with phonics in Y2

My DD scored 31/40, so one off the 'pass' mark. Actually I'm really happy with this as I know that she will now benefit from extra phonics help in Year 2, before retaking the test next June. Had she scored one or two more, then she would not be getting the same extra help.

I'd far rather this situation over, say, her scoring 34/40 and receiving no intervention. IMO if a child doesn't get a minimum of 37+/40, then they haven't confidently grasped it.

Some of it is common sense. When you learn to spell, you learn that ten spells a number and a different word with a t on the end of it spells the name of something that you sleep in. Children aren't nearly as stupid as some adults would have us believe. It's not blending or phonemes that are important in that case, it's the fact that if you choose the wrong one, you're going to have a very bad night's sleep.

But, some of it is also experience she is a pronoun. But, if you put a p on the end of it, it turns into the name of a sheepdog. It's not phonics that tells you that, it's experience of rounding up woolly animals.

Some people might not reach their tenth birthday without phonics. But, for the rest of us, paying attention and reading books is sufficient.

????????????????????????????????

Dora, you have totally lost me... clearly the kids are brighter than I am.

You've lost me totally, Dora.

sh is a phonic as is ee ... so sh-e and Sh-ee-p, use phonics. She is a tricky word as the e is not an eh sound but an ee sound.