Phonics Test in Y1

[LoveWine123]

Can someone tell me more about the phonics test in Y1? Is this a reflection on the school, the child's abilities or both? Should I be doing something specific to prepare my child and will the result from the test affect my child in any way? I am new to the UK school system so any feedback is much appreciated.

No you don’t need to do anything at all. And if the school’s any good they’ll play it down too. It will identify the kids who really don’t “get” phonics and they’ll have a bit of extra help before they retake next year. It’s more of a screening than a test.

The phonics screening is to check whether your child has learned the sounds that make up words in English. If they don't meet the necessary standard they should be given intervention in y2. It is also a reflection on the school if they don't get almost all to pass as it shows their teaching is poor. It should be a 'non issue' at most schools.

The only thing you need to do is listen to your child read regularly and encourage them to sound out words and not to just guess from the shape of the word, or from pictures.

Many schools hold an info session on phonics when children are in Reception to help parents help their child. Put simply though you sound out the words without any extra 'uh' sounds.

So 'shop' is 'sh' 'o' 'p' not ess aitch oh pee or shuh oh puh.

No child knows every word so the fact that part of the test includes made up words doesn't matter. They are told whether a word is made up or not.

The child hardly need know there is a test. They just have a bit of 1-1 time with a teacher and get a sticker for trying hard at the end. Don't mention the test to your child.

Definitely no need to do any specific preparation. Just make sure your child is reading regularly and insist that they sound out unfamiliar words, no guessing. If your child does have any difficulties with phonics, you should know that through discussion with the teacher well before the time of the phonics check in June.

The check is a reflection of both the school and child. The school should have most of their children passing the check, but there may be a handful who don't pass in Y1. It can be down to SEN, EAL issues, attendance issues or just a child who isn't quite clicking with phonics yet. Not always down to the school.

The phonics test is a list of words (some real, some made up) to check each child's knowledge of phonics.

So made up words can be words like smap (sssss mmm aaaa p sounds phonetically) to slightly more complicated ones like choom (ch -oo - m phonetically)

You don't need to do anything to prepare - it's always helpful and encouraged that parents and children spend some time reading the reading level books that probably get sent home in your child's bookbag as reading out loud will help your child to progress with reading (and teachers don't have the time to listen to each child read a book every day)

It is just to make sure that the school are teaching phonics well. Both my DC got full marks. My eldest has SEN, and it is the only time he has ever met expected standards in anything at school. It is really nothing to worry about.

At my DS's school the children were told it was a "quiz". No mention of test or pass/ fail. They had weekly phonics homework in Y1 and for the few weeks before the test it entailed practice runs with real and made up words, which familiarised them with the format.

The most important thing to know is that it is meant to be a screening. Screening as in, determine if a child has, and can apply, the basic phonics knowledge required. It is not an assessment (what can each child do?) nor test (have they passed/failed to meet requirements?)

In 99% of cases a teacher should be able to tell you beforehand if the child will pass the screening. Because the teacher has continually been assessing each child's phonics learning and reading.
But very occasionally there is a child who just doesn't get phonics, but has managed to escape notice, as they have used alternative strategies to read, thus masking the fact that they don't really get phonics. These children are meant to be picked up by the screening. Hence there are 'alien' words in the screening, and the words are not in context, so any alternative strategies won't work, only phonics.

The requirement to conduct the phonics screening has focused some schools on actually doing what they are statutorily required to do, i.e. teach phonics (systematic, synthetic phonics, that is). Sadly even now there are schools/teachers who think they know better and would happily gloss over that statutory requirement if it weren't for the phonics screening.

In theory, if a school teaches phonics well, then zero 'test preparation' should be necessary - inside or outside of school. Children should not be prepared to pass the 'test' - they should be taught phonics, which should automatically lead them to pass.

So if a school is giving Y1 children sheets of (regular and alien) words to read in preparation of the screen, or even sending such sheets home as homework, it indicates that a) the school's phonics teaching is so poor that they have opted to 'cram' for the test instead, and/or b) they fundamentally do not understand the nature and purpose of the screen.

Our school for instance refers to the screen as 'phonics assessment' which just wants me to bang my head against a wall.

So no, there is no need to prepare your child for it. Though if the school's phonics teaching is poor, you might want to support your child's phonics learning at home (e.g. provide decodable books for reading practice, if the school provides old-style non-decodable ones). Not for the purpose of passing the 'test', but rather for the purpose of helping them learn to read!

Will the outcome of the screen affect your child in some way? It shouldn't, except if your child is one of those rare ones who have fooled everyone into believing they understood phonics when actually they haven't. In which case 'failing' the check would mean that they will get extra phonics help in Y2, which they wouldn't otherwise, because their phonics weakness would have remained undetected.

If your child can't do phonics well enough to pass the screening, then they should be getting extra support to help their phonics improve. The teacher should be well aware that they are struggling so they should be getting that help before the screening, and after the screening in Y2, and the screening result should not affect that.
If your child can do phonics well enough to pass the screening, then the teacher will also know that, before the screening happens, and will not need the screening to tell them this. So again, the result of the screening won't affect the child.

So really the screening results shouldn't be any surprise to anyone. If a school gets consistently low percentages for passing (i.e. 80-90% or such) then it won't be coming as a surprise to the Y1 teacher(s) that 10-20% of their students each year aren't learning phonics well enough. They will know each year before the screening which 3-6 out of 30 won't 'pass' - in other words they know that they are teaching phonics badly and letting 10-20% of children down, and ergo they will be looking at their phonics teaching strategies.
Or they will blame the government for making them teach phonics and making them administer a pointless test, and continue failing 10-20% of their children every year.

Thank you all for the extremely helpful comments on the phonics screening and on learning phonics in general. My son is above average in reading for his age and able to read words that he sees for the first time. This has always put me at ease, but now I will make sure he can actually sound these words out rather than say them directly and try to guess as he does sometimes. My native language is not English and I was introduced to the world of phonics when my son started school last year so it's all a bit new to me. Thanks again for the helpful comments.

My very able reader DC1 passed this test but only just. My less able DC2 who is horrified at the idea of reading for fun got full marks. It's a test of phonics only. DC1 was way past sounding out when the test was done.

DC1 was way past sounding out when the test was done.

Properly 'very able readers' will know to sound out when they come across a word they don't know. You do not become way past sounding out. Otherwise how do you read new words like quidditch or hydrotherapy?

This is a really harmful way of thinking about things. I am in my 50s. I still need to sound out words in my head when I come across new ones (eg in DD's GCSE biology).

Infant 'able readers' who don't use phonics can get unstuck in later primary when they come across new words. They also can become a bit blasé and misread similar words such as electric/eclectic/excentric.

The phonics screening is to ensure schools are teaching phonics properly. It will have no impact on your child's school career.

In the whole time I've been screening in year 1 ive always found it to be the more able who struggle as they will naturally try to make real words out of alien/psuedo words, and the tests often have words that will trick the most able. For example the alien word will be 'Strom' and a sight reader will say 'storm'.

Brilliotic your post is really clear and explains the PSC very well. However, I don't agree that if a school isn't getting over 90% achieving the expected level, then it means that they're not teaching phonics well enough.

It is very possible to have schools where over 10% or even over 20% of the Y1 chn have severe SEND, are new to English, new to education or similar.

If we were able to look at the % of children who had been at the school since reception, without the kind of SEN that prevents them from passing the PSC (I'm talking non-verbal) then it would be a clearer reflection of the school's phonics teaching.

MrsKCastle makes a very valid point. Last year over 90% of our children achieved the expected level, this year just under 75% did so. We haven't changed the way we teach phonics, nor have we changed the staff. What has changed is the children in the cohort-this year nearly a quarter of the children have significant SEN, including severe AS, Downs syndrome, several with hearing impairements and several with severe speech and language difficulties, including one selective mute child. Less than 60% of these children achieved a GLD at the end of EYFS so actually we did well to achieve over 70% in the screening check!

To add to the percentages discussion, small schools can also have weird percentage pass rates. If there’s only 14 kids in a year, one child is a large percentage of the overall result.

I agree 10% is only up to 3 kids.
Some 6yo will lose concentration in that 10min. Or mess about.
5% of kids have adhd, some have asd. Others the parents do no practice at home

I'm so glad someone raised this issue. It is frustrating to read a comment that suggests less than 90% passing means poor teaching.

Our year group had 37% SEND last year. 3 children were allowed to be removed from the screening due to being non verbal. However, they still count in the reported data! Add to that the children who did take it with significant learning difficulties it was amazing for us to reach the 79% pass rate that we did!

Pink ive always found it to be the more able who struggle as they will naturally try to make real words out of alien/psuedo words, and the tests often have words that will trick the most able. For example the alien word will be 'Strom' and a sight reader will say 'storm'.

Why would an able child not be able to follow the instructions that this page contains alien words and that they should use their phonics knowledge to read them?

They aren't 'tricking the most able' they are screening and identifying the children who think they know everything already and don't use their phonics even when told it is a word they don't already know, or who actually can't use phonics as they have got away with memorising words and guessing.

DC1 was way past sounding out when the test was done

As TeenPlusTwenties says, no-one is ever past sounding out. I presume what you mean is that your child was past sounding out out loud and was doing it all in their head. This is perfectly fine as far as the test is concerned. There is no requirement for children to sound out the words out loud. The only question is whether they pronounce the real words correctly (with allowance for their accent and any speech impediments) and produce phonically plausible pronunciations for the made up words.

ive always found it to be the more able who struggle as they will naturally try to make real words out of alien/psuedo words, and the tests often have words that will trick the most able. For example the alien word will be 'Strom' and a sight reader will say 'storm'.

If you see "strom" and say "storm" you've got it wrong. That might be understandable if you see "strom" in the middle of a sentence where "storm" makes sense. But when "strom" is an isolated word and the child has been told it is not a real word but the name of a creature, I struggle to see how a child reading it as "storm" can be called a good reader.

Of course you can have a tricky year with e.g. lots of SN. Which is why I wrote 'consistently' low percentages.

And yes I am aware that some schools will have 'tricky years' most of the time, due to their area/structural intake. Sorry if I glossed over that.

I expect in these cases the teachers will know for each child that didn't pass the PSC why exactly they didn't pass the PSC. They won't be saying 'oh well the PSC is hard, some children just need a little more time' (it really is not hard) nor will they be saying 'it is always the able readers who struggle' or similar.

My very limited experience of schools achieving 80-90% on the PSC though are schools that are complacent rather than dealing with SN; they think 15% failing the PSC is a good result. Hence they don't bother looking at their phonics teaching, which in fact falls short (non-decodable books for practising phonics, encouraging guessing, teach phonics from Oct-Jan in reception then stop and move to alphabet and letter names, prepare for PSC in Y1 by doing exercises such as 'is this a real word or an alien word' and making the children read lists and lists of words ('mock PSCs')).