Phonics is a way of teaching children to read and write by blending and segmenting individual sounds. Every letter and different combinations of letters make particular sounds. At Queen Victoria we follow ‘Little Wandle Letters and sounds revised’ Programme which is split into 5 phases that systematically build on skills and knowledge of previous learning.

Children throughout Reception and Key stage 1 take part in daily phonics sessions. These sessions focus on key reading skills such as decoding to read words and segmenting the sounds in a given word to spell. During Phonics lessons we also teach children to read and write ‘tricky words’ also known as ‘sight words.’ These are words that you cannot sound out and children are just expected to remember how to read and write. Children in LKS2 may also receive phonics sessions if they need extra support or further practice in order to become a fluent reader. Phonics is the only route to decoding here at Queen Victoria.

Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised is a complete systematic synthetic phonics programme (SSP) developed for schools by schools. Based on the original Letters and Sounds, but extensively revised to provide a complete teaching programme meeting all the expectations of the National Curriculum, the Ofsted Deep Dive into reading and preparing your children to go beyond the expectations of the Phonics Screening Check.

Key Terms we use in our teaching or mantras we use in the classroom:

Phoneme – a single unit of sound

Grapheme – a written letter, or group of letters that represent a sound.

Consonants – b, c, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, q, r, s, t, v, w, x, y, z

Vowels – a, e, i, o, u

Digraph – two letters make one sound (e.g. sh, ch,).

Trigraph – three letters make one sound (e.g. igh, ear, air).

Split digraph – two letters make one sound but the letters have been split apart by another letter.

Blend – to put or merge the sounds together to make a word (e.g. the sounds d-o-g are blended to the word ‘dog’.)

Segment – to break down the word into its individual sounds to spell (e.g cat can be split into the sounds c-a-t.).

Speedy sounds – process of recapping previously taught GPCs.

Segmenting fingers – teaching strategy used to segment a word.

Sound talk – teaching strategy used for oral blending.

Tricky bit – used to identify the tricky part of a word.

Chunk-it up – To break up a longer word and read it in one part (chunk) at a time, to avoid being overwhelmed and to ease the process of blending.

Catchphrase – A type of mnemonic in the form of a memorable (often funny) catchphrase. Used in some of the later GPC’s learned, where a picture alone, might not give enough of a hook.