Read Write Inc Guide for Parents

Read Write Inc Phonics Guidance for Parents / Carers Dear Parents and Carers, This information in this booklet will explain the phonics teaching that your child will receive at school. It also provides information on how you can help support your child’s phonics development at home. If you need clarification or would like to know more about our phonics teaching, please get in touch with your child’s class teacher.

Please also see http://www.oxfordowl.co.uk for further information.

Thank you.

What is Read Write Inc? Read Write Inc (RWI) is a phonics based programme which helps children learn to read whilst also developing a wide range of vocabulary and encouraging a love of stories.

The alphabet contains 26 letters but spoken English uses about 44 sounds. These sounds are represented by a letter or a group of letters.

What do all these technical words mean?

What is a phoneme?

A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound within a word. They are taught to students when learning phonics. For example, the word ‘dog’ consists of three phonemes (d-o-g).

What is a grapheme?

A grapheme is a written symbol that represents a sound (phoneme). This can be a single letter or a sequence of letters such as ‘ai’, ‘sh’, ‘igh’. So when a child says the sound ‘s’ this is a phoneme, but when they write the letter ‘s’ it is a grapheme.

What is a speed sound?

In Read Write Inc the individual sounds are called ‘speed sounds’ because we want your child to read then effortlessly. For example ‘m’, ‘h’, ‘oi’.

What is a digraph / trigraph?

This is when two or three letters come together to make a phoneme. For example, ‘oa’ makes the phoneme in b-oa-t, ‘igh’ makes the phoneme in n-igh-t.

In RWI digraphs and trigraphs are called special friends.

What is blending?

Blending is bringing the phonemes together to make a word, e.g. c-a-t

cat

What is segmenting?

Segmenting is the ability to separate a word into its sounds / phonemes, e.g. dog d-o-g.

Fred talk In RWI Fred is a toy frog who only uses ‘Fred talk’. Fred can only sound out words, children listen to Fred and blend the phonemes to make the word. For example, Fred would say ‘t-oy’, children will blend and say ‘toy’.

Green words Green words are words which your child will be able to read as they are made up of the speed sounds that they will have learnt.

Red words Red words are words that can’t be decoded using phonetic knowledge. Children have to learn them. For example, ‘I’, ‘are’, ‘to’.

Speed sounds are grouped into 3 sets: We use pure sounds so that your child will be able to blend the sounds into words more easily.

Letter-sound pictures are used to help your child to learn these quickly. e.g.

m m Maisie m m mountain

t t tower

Set 1 sounds are taught in the following order, one at a time. m

a

s

d

t

i

n

p

g

o

c

k

u

b

f

e

l

h

r

j

v

y

w

z

x

sh

th

ch

qu

ng

nk

Once students have learnt the first 5 sounds we teach them to blend them, when we say words in pure sounds, we use ‘Fred talk’.

We never use letter names at this early stage.

Students use at this stage: Blending Books and Red, Green and Purple storybooks.

Set 2 and Set 3 During Set 2, children will learn the following ‘special friends’ alongside red words. ay

ee

igh

ow

oo

oo

ar

or

air

ir

ou

oy

During Set 2, children will spend a lot of time learning about how these sounds are used in words. They will begin to blend and segment these sounds in words, captions and sentences.

Students use at this stage: Pink, Orange and Yellow Story Books.

Set 3 will introduce alternate graphemes for sounds already taught in Sets 1 and 2 ea

oi

a-e

i-e

o-e

u-e

ew

ire

ear

ure

tious tion

aw

are

ur

Students use at this stage: Blue and Grey Story Books

er

ow

ai

oa

What are ‘bouncy’ and ‘stretchy’ sounds in Read Write Inc ‘Bouncy’ sounds are short sounds.

Each sound has a saying to help us remember the correct sound, for example mmmountain, sssnake and a saying to help us remember how to form the letters correctly, e.g. Maisie, mountain, mountain, slither down the snake.

Make the sound as short as possible, avoiding uh at the end of the sound t - t-t-t tower (tick tongue behind the teeth - unvoiced) - Down the tower, across the tower p - p-p-p pirate (make distinctive p with lips - unvoiced) - Down the plait, up and over the pirate's face k - k-k-k kangaroo (make sharp click at back of throat) - Down the kangaroo's body, tail and leg c - c-c-c caterpillar (as above) - Curl round the caterpillar h - h-h-h horse (say h as you breathe sharply out - unvoiced) - Down the horse's head to his hooves and up over his back ch - The caterpillar's hairs make the horse sneeze ch-ch-ch (make a short sneezing sound) - Curl round the caterpillar, then down the horse’s head, to his hooves and up over his back x - x-x-x exercise (say a sharp c and add s - unvoiced)- Cross down the arm and leg and cross the other way

You might find it harder to avoid saying uh at the end of these bouncy sounds. d - d-d-d dinosaur (tap tongue behind the teeth) - Round the dinosaur's bottom, up his tall neck and down to his feet g - g-g-g girl (make soft sound in throat) - Round the girl's face, down her hair and give her a curl b - b-b-b boot (make a short, strong b with lips) - Down to the heel, up and over the toe j - j-j-j Jack-in-the-box (push lips forward) - Down his body, curl and dot y - y-y-y yak (keep edges of tongue against teeth) - Down a horn, up a horn and under the yak's head w - w-w-w worm (keep lips tightly pursed) - Down, up, down, up the worm qu - qu-qu-qu queen (keep lips pursed as you say cw- unvoiced) - Round the queen's head, up to her crown, down her hair and curl

‘Stretchy’ sounds are long sounds.

Try to avoid saying ‘uh’ after each one. m - mmmmmmountain (keep lips pressed together hard) - Maisie, mountain, mountain s - sssssnake (keep teeth together and hiss - unvoiced) - Slither down the snake n - nnnnnnet (keep tongue behind teeth) - Down Nobby, up, over his net f - ffffflower (keep teeth on bottom lip and force air out sharply - unvoiced) - Down the stem and draw the leaves l - llllleg (keep pointed curled tongue behind teeth) - Down the long leg r - rrrrrrobot (say rrr as if you are growling) - Down the robot, up and over his arm v - vvvvvvulture (keep teeth on bottom lip and force air out gently) - Down a wing, up a wing z - zzzzzzip (keep teeth together and make a buzzing sound) - Zig-zag-zig th - thhhhank you ( stick out tongue and breathe out sharply) - Down the tower, across the tower, then down the horse's head to the hooves and up over his back sh - shhhh said the horse to the hissing snake (shhh noise as in 'be quiet!') - Slide down the snake, then down the horse's head to the hooves and over his back ng - thinnnnngg on a strinnnngg (curl your tongue at the back of your throat) - Down nobby, up, over his net then round the girl’s face, down her hair and give her a curl nk - I think I stink (i.e 'nk' in oink) - Down nobby, up, over his net then down the kangaroo’s body, tail and leg

Vowels The short vowels should be kept short and sharp. a - a-a-a apple (open mouth wide as if to take a bite of an apple) - Round the apple and down the leaf e - e-e-e egg (release mouth slightly from a position) - Chop off the top and scoop out the egg i - i-i-i insect (make a sharp sound at the back of the throat - smile) - Down the body and a dot for the head o - o-o-o orange (push out lips, make the mouth into o shape) - All around the orange u: u-u-u umbrella (make a sound in the throat) - Down and under, up to the top and draw the puddle

The long vowel sounds are all stretchy sounds and have a caption to help children remember them. ay: ay, may I play? ee: ee, what do you see? igh: fly high ow: blow the snow oo: poo at the zoo oo: look at a book ar: start the car or: shut the door air: that's not fair ir: whirl and twirl ou: shout it out oy: toy for a boy

What can I do at home to support my child?

A great way to engage children at home with phonics is to play games. Matching pairs, snap, sorting words or letters can all be ways to help teach your children.

Being phonics detectives, finding red words or sounds in a book is also a fun way to explore phonics at home.

How to listen to your child read  Do not read the book aloud before your child reads it to you.  Ask your child to read the sounds and words before he or she reads the story.  When your child reads the story, ask him or her to sound out the words that he or she can’t read automatically.  Don’t allow your child to struggle too much. Praise your child when she or he succeeds.  Read back each sentence or page to keep the plot moving (your child’s energy is going into reading the words not the story!).  Do not ask you child to guess using the pictures.  Do it all with patience and love.

Websites Home reading - Ruth Miskin Phonics Training http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk

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