Intent

At Kingsley Primary we aim to ensure that all children can read confidently and fluently.

Our school is wonderfully diverse, with many of our children having English as a second language. For our learners, it is vital that we teach high quality phonics using our systematic phonics programme whilst also implementing a whole language-based classroom environment.

Please continue reading to find out how we teach Phonics at our school.

Implementation & Impact

Our systematic synthetic phonics programme (SSP) is Monster Phonics. We have a careful balance between effective, high quality Monster Phonics lessons and the whole language approach through our use of Literacy Counts English scheme. The units of work focus on engaging, vocabulary-rich real texts , with a wealth of writing opportunities linked.

Monster Phonics

Monster Phonics is our whole school Phonics scheme. Monster Phonics is a DfE validated child-centred phonics programme. We believe that our programme and approach to phonics gives our children the best opportunity to be successful with early reading as well as empowering our teachers with excellent subject knowledge and high-quality planning and resources. This ensures children enjoy and get the most from their phonics lessons.

Monster Phonics uses a systematic colour-coding of graphemes linked to phoneme monsters which makes phonics easier to understand. Our children also love the monsters, who bring phonics to life. The phonics activities are multisensory requiring reading, writing, singing and actions.

Teaching Approach

Consistency across the school, in our approach to teaching phonics, is key to its success.

Pupils are streamed across EYFS and Phase 1 and taught daily discrete phonics sessions. Any children identified as not meeting the learning objectives that day are identified and picked up for same day catch up intervention. We also provide Phonological Awareness interventions for children identified as requiring additional support with blending. Regular and efficient monitoring of children’s development in phonics is essential if they are to become competent and confident readers, and subsequently writers. The Monster Phonics programme has a clearly mapped out set of assessments which allows for checking children’s grapheme-phoneme correspondence (GPC), knowledge of High-Frequency Words (HFWs) and Common Exception Words (CEWs) for reading and writing.

At the end of each term, teachers use Phonics Tracker for their Summative Assessment. This allows teachers to assess pupils in real-time and it can be viewed at any time by the Phonics and Assessment Leads. This allows pupil’s gaps to be identified quickly and addressed.

All teachers ensure that phonics is embedded throughout daily classroom practice. Focused phonics intervention and in class support is provided for those who still require phonics in Year 3 and KS2.

Phonics Screening Check Year One

All Year one children are formally assessed at the end of the year by an unseen government Phonic Screening Check. The children are asked to decode real words and ‘alien words’. Results of this screening check are reported to parents. Any child who does not reach the expected standard in Year One will receive appropriate support and repeat the check in Year Two.

Home Reading Books

All children are encouraged to read at home daily through individual year group reading incentives. We have invested in the Monster Phonics reading scheme which provides fully decodable books aligned to the programme. Alongside this we supplement with the use Bug Club books up to Phase 3 (Reception) which are also fully aligned with our Monster Phonics teaching structure. Once children are secure with year 1 Phonics they may read a non-scheme book alongside their phonics scheme reader. All children also take a reading for pleasure book from our wonderful selection which is updated regularly. Alongside 1-1 reading, all children from Year 1 upwards receive Guided Reading sessions, where they can practice and apply their phonics skills to a variety of texts.

Useful Websites:

• https://monsterphonics.com/- The Monster Phonics Website
• http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/ - Lot of games to play
• https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/levels/z3g4d2p- Explore All areas of the Curriculum

Follow this link to read some books using your Bug Club Login https://www.activelearnprimary.co.uk/login?c=0

Follow this link to access the Monster Phonics e-books https://monsterphonics.com/ebooks/home/ 

Username: parent@kingsley.liverpool.sch.uk Password: Homelearning