Avoiding " mixed" reading methods

[MrEBear]

DS is still in preschool but will be one of the oldest in his class when he starts in 2016. I put the question here rather than preschool as I thought I would get better answers.

The schools around me all seem to do Jolly Phonics and the old Biff chip books. Which seems daft. They also start giving out reading books before the kids have learned all the letters.

I had the idea to try to get him reading using phonics before he starts school. Therefore avoiding the confusion that mixed methods can bring and he can also go at his own pace. I've got the jp activity books at home currently working on book 2 and we have the Songbirds books but not looked at them yet.

Am I doing the right thing or should I leave it until he starts school?

I am not a teacher so not a expert, but I think it really depend on the child.

I'm not English, so I had no clue on phonics etc, so I just followed my child's lead and taught him alphabet names. And he was able to read before school.

He had no problem doing phonics at school. He actually enjoyed it and it made his decoding skills stronger.

If your dc wants to start reading, you would know.

That's what I did with all three of my dc. I used reading chest as a good source of phonic books but for the younger two I started them on reading eggs first to get them going. All three have been able to decode a good number of words before getting to reception where they are faced with look-and-say from day 1

I think the most important thing is to get them interested in books. It really doesn't matter what scheme they use but enthusiasm is a big help in moving them forward. Try books that will interest your child and this will help with the reading schemes which can be a little bland.

Hehehehehe good to hear that I am not the only person to think on this logic. I honestly think it is bonkers that they expect children to learn to read before they know their letters and sounds.

What level did you get them to before school?

Wonkeylegs I read lots to him to him. Which is fine but its hard to find books to start a child reading unless you use a scheme.
I'm sure some teachers do use picture books but I'm just a mum so will stick with a scheme or schemes somebody else has put together.

Anybody used the Usborne first readers with sections for parent to read?

If the schools around you are doing JP, then these follow JP order and are free to download.
www.speld-sa.org.au/services/phonic-books.html

I took mine through to the end of Green level phonics books before starting school.

Rafaisthekingofclay, thank-you very much for that link. Most appreciated I would never have found that.

Hehehehe great to know that it is do able to get him to that level.

I found DS actually responded well to reading with me, without the scheme books. I'm not saying don't use a scheme if that works for you but make sure you foster that enjoyment through what you read with him as well as you will find they progress and sustain that as they grow and it will help with the phonics /biff & chip etc. This is a real problem for boys in DSs class who don't seem to come to enjoying books as naturally as we'd like them to.

We didn't deliberately set out to teach DD phonics but she picked it up alongside her older brother and we supported it when we realised she could/wanted to. I'm particularly pleased she did given we have some suspicions that the school are encouraging mixed methods.

What level you can get to just depends how he takes to it, just like they don't all end reception on the same level. Don't worry about it. If he can match letters to sounds and decode simple words, it's a great start. Some kids start reception reading chapter books. I think as long as he's having fun with it you're doing no harm and probably a lot of good.

The songbirds books are great. Can I also put in a word for Teach Your Monster to Read?

PS are you sure they're all using the old ORT books? There are newer ones which are phonics based.

I taught my son to read before he started school eight years ago. Like you I was worried about mixed methods. However I didn't bother to teach my daughter because she didn't want to know. She just wanted to learn how to swim and do handstands at the age of three/ four.

The phonics check has really improved the quality of reading instruction in the UK. My daughter had nothing but decodable readers for the whole of reception. She has caught up with children who were taught to read before reception.

I feel the greatest gift you can give your child is vocabulary development and understanding of the world. Most children find learning to read by synthetic phonics quick and easy. (If no mixed methods are used) Reading a range of literature to your child is invaluable.

Good quality decodable books make the experience of learning to read easier. Sadly many schools do not have enough decodable books.

The methods aren't mixed. The letter knowledge and books support each other. My child has learnt the first 10 phonic letters already he has been at school 12 days. He will know all his phonic sounds by half term probably.

Initially he was sent home with wordless biff chip books but now he has extremely simple short sentences on each page. 'I am a cat' 'Tom is a cat' 'Tim is a top cat'. All the above words are created from letters they have learnt. Blending is learnt through practice. Guessing using the pictures is expected with simple and slightly more complicated words.

You can teach phonics at home if she's really keen to learn them but make sure you teach the sounds correctly as it could be very confusing for her

Would just note that Saltedcaramel14s school appears to be using the new, decodable, ORT books. Not all schools do; many use the older Look Say scheme. In which case the methods certainly would be 'mixed'..

Salted, that sounds like the newer phonics based ORT, not the old ones. They may have covered all the simple single letter correspondences by half term but won't have covered all sounds and alternative spellings of them that they're likely to need to read non phonics scheme books independently. If they're really using old ORT I think OP is right to be concerned.

Snap! @catkind

I'm fairly sure that the school will be using the old look and say books. It seems to be the way with most cash strapped Scottish schools who don't need to worry about the phonics tests.

Other P1's I know are get books with words to read and list of words to learn as homework with in their first week.(remember we don't have reception)

So I'm keen to get him started reading before I end up pulling my hair out. I also have the advantage that I spent time a few years ago working on phonics with a dyslexia tutor to improve my spelling, and so I wasn't the hopeless mum when it came to homework

I didn't realise you were in Scotland. It makes sense to teach him to read as he would be in school if he was in England. I didn't realise that the phonics check was just an English thing. That would explain why the Scottish schools have not revamped their reading stock.

I suggest you get a range of decodable books. There are a lot of good decodable books now. Songbirds are good, but a little limited in number. My daughter had a diet of dandelion readers, jelly and bean, floppy phonics and Ruth miskin books in reception.

Thanks really tired. I'll have a look at some of those too. Scotland are just looking at reintroducing national testing.

But even if the school does have decode able readers it still makes sense to know letters before issuing books issuing books on week one means no time to learn letters.

Of the ones your daughter used which were the most engaging?

I think there are some areas that are an exception, but generally Scotland is slightly behind England in getting phonics into schools.

And the phonics screening check is a bit of a motivator in England, which helps.

Book People usually have songbirds quite cheaply. They also have some Floppy's phonics non-fiction. RWI black and white versions used to be available quite cheaply on Amazon.

I'm sure you probably know this, but if you are using different schemes the you need to make sure each book/level he reads is decodable using the knowledge he has. Otherwise they end up being 'non-decodable' books.

Crumbs, its really hard to say which publisher produced the best decodable books. My daughter liked the songbirds books best, but if you have a diet of nothing but songbird books it can get a bit repeatitive. My daughter really enjoyed the Jelly and bean books as well,

From a teaching prospective I like the Ruth Miskin Books and the floppy phonics books best because they had a page with the sounds to practice and questions for the parents to ask the child. Possibly the illustrations as not quite as attractive as other books. The dandelion readers were nicely illustrated and it was clear which sounds a child needed to know to read each book.

There are some free phonics ebooks on www.oxfordowl.co.uk so you can see what songbird books, ruth miskin books and floppy phonics books are like. You can in theory filter the free books so you only got phonics books, however not all the books that come up as being "phonics books" are strictly speaking decodable books.

I suggest you look at the website of the publishers as they often have samples on their website. A lot is personal preference. Some children prefer non fiction books to fiction books.

I wasn't keen on level 1 of the jolly phonics readers, but level 2 (yellow) are nice books. level 3 (Green) are difficult books.

Maybe you should post on the bullitin board of the reading reform foundation as they have some fanastic reading experts on there.

rrf.org.uk/messageforum/

Its worth looking at ebay as brand new decodable books can get expensive.

Great minds maizie

YY to keeping an eye on the book people. Various phonics sets come up. We had some nice colour Read Write Inc from there too.

You can also go a long way with games, online or physical, before worrying about books. I mentioned TYMTR, there's also a lot on the BBC's alphablocks completely free. And the JP songs my kids used to like on youtube, have you found those? DS liked playing with (decodable) flashcards or fridge magnet letters, taking turns with me making words or sentences and reading them to each other. The sillier the better.

Thank you ladies, I've got a set ordered from book people.

Yes Oxford reading owls have phonics books on line