Y1 Phonics test/reading levels

[Bluebells44]

Do scores on the phonics test generally correlate to reading levels overall? If there are children who are “working towards” reading on their school report but scoring slightly higher on the phonics screening than a greater depth reader, is that normal?

All the phonics scores were passing by a wide margin so no real issues otherwise.

Hi @Bluebells44, I’m a year 1 teacher. If a child scores slightly higher than average, they can still be considered for WTS. When assessing for WT/EXS/GD, we consider decoding, fluency, and comprehension. .

Thank you @Dippee thats helpful. Would you expect a near perfect score or particular score range for a greater depth reader?

@Bluebells44 in short, the Phonics Screening Test does not correlate to reading levels. The PST is made up of 40 words (20 'real' words and 20 'alien' words) it's merely and indicator of how well they have progressed with their phonics learning. The pass mark is 32/40. Last year, nationally, 80% of Y1 pupils passed.
Reading levels take much more into consideration than just segmenting and blending individual words such as: punctuation, expression and fluency and comprehension and is a best fit guide. Depending on the age and point in the school year, there are reading level averages i.e. which colour book band they're on.
Hope this helps 🤗

I taught my 3 yr old to read using high frequency word flash cards and First Steps in Reading books. I didn't fill in the phonics gaps because I didn't know how his school taught them. By the end of reception his teacher ( unofficially) gave him the yr 1 phonics test, which he got full marks in. 40/40 I think it is. He's always been greater depth for everything reading related.

Thank you @MyTwoDads it’s helpful to know that there isn’t an exact correlation. My son had greater depth on his school report but missed a few on the phonics screening which surprised me. I will trust the teacher’s judgment and go over phonics again to make sure there are no gaps.

I wouldn't worry about going over the phonics. Just keep reading. It's good that he's got comprehension, which is the ultimate goal of learning to read.

My DS passed the phonics screen but is definitely a weaker reader than my DD who didn’t pass. I think both got EXS but in reality DS should have been WT or below to be honest- he just got lucky on the day.

@Bluebells44 I once had two gds children not score full marks but they were definetly gds! And chn that score 40/40 does not necessary mean gds. my nephew scores 40/40 but has always been expected for reading. Sorry for punctuation. Its been a long day!

*my nephew scored

The phonics screening is not necessarily related to their ability as a reader. It suggests they're good at identifying phonic code (graphemes - the written representation of sounds) and blending them to identify words. These are important skills for reading, but far from the only skills needed to be a good reader. A child can score highly on the phonics screening but not be the best reader in the class, due to lacking in fluency and/or comprehension skills. A child can just scrape a pass in the phonics screening but be an overall better reader.

I HATE the phonics screening test with a passion. It's the most pointless assessment, asking children to decode words which aren't even real to 'check' whether they have good code knowledge and blending skills. Many good readers are way past needing to sound out and blend by the end of Year 1. The test can trip good sight readers up, as their brain automatically wants to substitute a nonsense 'alien word' for a real one which looks similar. Many adults would struggle with such a silly test, as we naturally sight read so our brains are looking for words and will automatically switch around letters in a word to help it make sense (which is why it's so easy to miss typos, when two letters are accidentally reversed, as our brain automatically reads it as the intended word). For example, so many people would skim read the word starp as strap. It's not uncommon for good readers to make mistakes on words which are cruelly designed to trip them up.

Unfortunately, in an attempt to irradiate the risk of mistakes, so many schools encourage children to go back to sounding everything out in the run up to the phonics screening, to ensure they don't make a mistake through sight reading. That's a huge backwards step, as so many struggle to get back out of the habit even though they're more than capable of sight reading. It's such a pointlessly frustrating test.

Anyway, I digress. Basically, it's very possible for a child to be assessed higher in reading than a peer who scored higher in their phonics screening.

It could just be that he is a good sight reader with a good memory for words, but he struggles to use his phonic knowledge to read new words.

Year 1 teacher and phonics lead here. As pp have mentioned, the phonics screening check is merely a test of how well the child can decode individual words, whereas their reading level is based on other areas of reading, such as comprehension and inference. What often happens with greater depth readers is that they rely on their excellent sight reading skills and (incorrectly) make the alien words into real words. For example reading the alien word ‘strom’ as ‘storm’. Or they speed-read and make simple mistakes, such as reading ‘presses’ as ‘pressed’, or ‘saucers’ as ‘sauces’. This is often why they drop marks in the phonics screening check. It doesn’t sound like your child needs extra phonics support if they only got a few wrong. Their reading level is a bigger indicator of whether they need support. You’d bet that they wouldn’t read the above words incorrectly in the context of a sentence, or they’d go back and self-correct when they realised it didn’t make sense. On the opposite side of the coin, I’ve had children who have English as an additional language, who have very limited English, but score 40/40 on the screening check because we’ve taught them how to accurately decode. They haven't got a clue what any of the words mean, and have zero comprehension, so come out with working towards (or below) as their reading level. The two things aren’t necessarily linked. Being good at one, doesn’t necessarily make you good at the other, and vice versa.

I've just read your update. For some reason I assumed you were querying why your child wasn't assessed as higher in reading, if they scored so highly in their phonics screening. I now see it's the other way around. Don't panic! I hope you are reassured by the responses that he is rightly the good reader his teacher has assessed him to be, despite dropping marks in his phonics screening. Hopefully you understand now why that may have been.

He definitely doesn't need to keep practising phonics. When it comes to the screening, a pass is a pass. It doesn't matter whether he got 32, 40 or anything inbetween. He's clearly a good reader, so just let him enjoy it for pleasure over the summer.

That's such a good point about context. You're right, it's easy to make a mistake with individual flash card words as there is no context. Good readers genuinely work out the correct word, or at least self-correct, when they are reading in the context of a sentence. As you say, this is much harder for EAL children who are still acquiring the English language, which is why many do well reading individual words on the phonics screening but are assessed as Working Towards in reading overall, as they just don't have the comprehension skills yet to match their word reading ability.

My daughter got greater depth for reading (and rightly so as she’s been reading chapter books since reception) but 39/40 on the phonics. Even good readers can make a mistake. Interestingly she knew she’d got it wrong - she told me her score was 39, and I assumed the teacher had told her. But when I quizzed further she said she knew she’d only got one wrong. When I got her report she was bang on.

Id say it’s likely there’s a correlation between scores on the screening and reading ability but you do get outliers - kids who are amazing at phonics but comprehension etc means they don’t get high reading marks, and fluent readers who have moved past phonics and make mistakes as a result.

Thank you all. That’s very reassuring! Interestingly I had the same experience as @modgepodge where he knew exactly what his score was and which ones he had gotten wrong, so the report wasn’t a surprise for us.

I didn’t worry about it until other parents were sharing scores and reading levels. We didn’t practice phonics as much as some of them and I suppose I was worried I had become too relaxed and let him down.

Many of the posts here have struck a chord. I think that phonics went too slowly for him and he began to rely on sight words and memory, using context etc. So he’s not in the habit of using his phonics. If this doesn’t matter in the long run, I won’t worry about it. He loves reading and we have no other worries about it at home. His teachers have praised his reading ability independently so they must also be happy with his comprehension etc. We will carry on with reading for fun!