Phonics at Richmond Hill
Our phonics curriculum begins with phonics exploration and sensory experiences. For some of our children phonics will always be taught in this way.
Pupils who are able to access general environmental sounds are then taught phonics through the Twinkl Phonics programme. A systematic, synthetic phonics programme will give our pupils the best opportunity to read. Our programme will take each pupil into consideration and be adapted to their needs where necessary. A plan lesson from the scheme may be broken down and repeated in different ways over an extended period of time. Overlearning is also key. Our pupils may need to spend more time on each area of learning and require a wider range of texts to apply their knowledge to. Pupils are streamed into phonics groups in order to deliver at the right level and to provide appropriate challenges.
We understand that some learners benefit from further strategies in order to develop in reading. Some of our pupils may have processing difficulties and find blending extremely difficult. For these pupils they may need additional interventions exposing them to sight vocab such as precision teaching. This will take place in addition to the planned phonics sessions. We also have a large selection of repetitive texts with high frequency vocab within. These texts build the pupils’ confidence, their fluency and can also model sentence structure for writing. The pupils will need to know the words within these texts through prior teaching. The texts are coded to match the pupil’s current level.
We recognise that our pupils' reading journey can be very different and that each child’s individual reading needs should be catered for. All pupils at levels follow the phonics curriculum, success and progress is recorded on evidence for learning, phonics progression maps and through EHCP targets where appropriate.
Phonics curriculum map Example
Phonics exploration |
Twinkle SSP phonics(level 1 up) | |||
Sound exposure (Early English) | Functional environment sounds functional eg microwave, road crossings | Environmental sounds general and generalise (Level 1) | Level 2-5 | Level 6 and SPAG |
Sensory Experience | Purposeful | Skill Development | Functional Skills | Intentional Applied Skills |
Experience and may respond to an increasing range of environmental/instrumental sounds Experience physical actions in response to a regular beat e.g. clap, stamp, jump or other movement Experience and explore how different sounds are made by banging, tapping, stroking and shaking Experience a range of sensory activities to develop fine motor skills. To experience and begin to respond to instructions. | Stills and/or looks towards a sound source Listen to and show interest in play with sounds, songs, rhymes and stories. Experience rhythm and rhyme through familiar nursery songs. Experiment with vocal sounds Imitate a range of sounds whilst interacting with others sounds Imitate babble sounds and/or use sounds during play. Experience massage/macpac linked to different genres of music. | Aspect 1 General Sound Discrimination – Environmental Sounds • Develop listening skills and awareness of sounds in the environment • Identify and remember the differences between sounds • Talk about sounds in greater detail
Aspect 2 General Sound Discrimination – Instrumental Sounds • Develop awareness of sounds made with instruments • Listen to and appreciate the difference between sounds made with instruments • Use a wide vocabulary to talk about instrument sounds
Aspect 3 Body Percussion • Develop awareness of sounds and rhythms
| Level 2: By the end of level 2, children should be able to: • give the phoneme when shown any Level 2 grapheme; • find any Level 2 grapheme, from a display, when given the phoneme; • orally blend and segment CVC words; • blend and segment in order to read and spell (using magnetic letters) VC words, such as if, am, on, up and nonsense words, such as ip, ug and ock; • read the five tricky words - the, to, I, no, go.
Sounds: s, a, t, p i, n, m, d g, o, c, k ck, e, u, r h, b, f, l ff, ll, ss
Level 3: By the end of Level 3, children should be able
| By the end of Level 6, children should be able to: • read accurately most words of two or more syllables; • read most words containing common suffixes; • read most common exception words; • read most words accurately, in age-appropriate books, without overt sounding and blending, fluent enough to allow them to focus on their understanding rather than on decoding individual words; • sound out most unfamiliar words accurately, without undue
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