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What is phonics?
What is the phonics screening test?
What will the test comprise of?
Example words
How will the test be administered?
What will happen after the test?
How you can help at home.
• Way of teaching children to read skillfully.
• Children are taught how to recognise phonemes (sounds)
that each individual letter makes and identify the sounds
that different combinations of letters (graphemes)
make eg. ‘oo’, ‘sh’, ‘air’ etc.
• Digraph - 2 letters that make 1 sound
cow
• Trigraph - 3 letters that make 1 sound
night
• Split digraph - 2 vowels with a consonant in between.
Used to be known as the magic e!
spine (i_e)
• They are then taught how to blend these phonemes
together to read the whole word.
• Children can then use their phonic knowledge to ‘de-
code’ unfamiliar words.
• In school children have 20 minutes of daily discreet
phonics teaching following the Government’s Letters and
Sounds programme.
• A statutory reading check that every Year 1 child in the
country will complete in the same week.
• It will take place in school during the week beginning
16th June. The check cannot be retaken at any other
time so it is essential that your child is in school this
week.
•
The focus of the check is to provide evidence of
children’s decoding and blending skills, not to test their
vocabulary.
• The check will consist of reading 40 words and non-words
(pseudo words)
• The children will be asked to ‘sound out’ a word and blend the
sounds together. e.g. s-t-ar-t
• Children will be told if the word is a real or ‘alien’ (pseudo)
word. The pseudo word will be put into context by having a
corresponding alien image. The children will be asked to read
the alien’s name.
• The children MUST sound out the correct phonemes and blend
together whichever graphemes form that particular word.
day
snemp
slideslide
blurst
newt
spron
phone
stroft
• With your child’s own teacher.
• In a quiet area of the school.
• We are not permitted to indicate to the children at the
time whether they have correctly sounded out and/or
blended the word.
• There is no time limit and the test is designed not to be
stressful for the children.
• High standard pass threshold of 32 out of 40
• Last year the national pass rate was 69%
• Anticipate good pass rate this year and have implemented
practise tests and additional intervention groups to
support children.
• Revise the Phase 2, 3 & 5 graphemes at home with your child
using the Phonics sound mats.
• Practice reading the sample real and pseudo words with your
child, encouraging them to ‘sound out’ the word and blend it
together.
• Help your child to use their phonic knowledge to ‘make up’
pseudo words using single letters, digraphs and trigraphs.
• Use online games on www.phonicsplay.co.uk to read real and
pseudo words.
• REMEMBER: Phonics is not the only thing needed to
become a fluent reader.
• Please continue to read with your child each night and
encourage them to:
• Sound out
• Re-read to check it makes sense.
• Use pictures for clues.
• Ask questions about the book.
• And most importantly ENJOY READING!
• The results of each check will be sent to the Local
Authority. Each Local Authority will then submit the
results to the Department for Education.
• We will inform you of whether your child has met the
national standard.
• Children’s reading develops at different rates and if your
child’s scores fails to achieve the national standard, further
support will be implemented this year and going into Year 2.
• Re-takes of the screening test for these children will take
place in Year 2.