Transcript Parent Workshop - The Downs CE Primary School

The Downs and Northbourne
Church of England Primary Schools
Reading Workshop –
January 2016
Our Intentions
for this afternoon
• To explore the ‘science’
behind reading.
• To explain how we teach
your child to read.
• How you can help your
child catch the reading
bug!
It can be a long and
frustrating task to
help your child learn
to read so it is
important to put
ourselves in their
position to
understand the
challenge they face.
The ‘science’ behind reading
Welcome to
The Downs.
Welcome to The
Downs.
Welcome to The
Downs.
Welcome to The
Downs.
First they need to understand that the
squiggles represent letters and that
letters together make words.
Imagine being presented with this and
being asked to read it. This is what it is
like for children looking at words.
The first thing we do is start to unpick
the meaning of individual letters.
e= e
Then we look at learning key words.
The = the
As we learn all the letters we will be
able to decode the sentence.
Good readers need many individual skills.
Each skill is like an individual thread –
only when they are used together do we
become a good reader.
If we only focus on one skill your child
may learn to read but they will not be a
‘good’ reader. This is often what we mean
when children bark at the print. They can
read the words but the words have no
meaning to them so the text is not
understood.
What are the individual threads?
• Knowing story pattern/language.
• Knowing sentence structure.
• Knowing a wide variety of words and
their meaning.
• Recognising individual sounds/words.
• Knowing how to segment and blend
sounds.
We all want your child to be a successful, GOOD readers
and to enjoy the experience of reading but learning to read is a
complicated skill and there is not one way which suits all children.
However the first step is the same for everyone – for children to
develop reading skills they need to have an understanding of the
English language. For all of us this happens through talk.
Through talk we learn new vocabulary and the knowledge of how to
structure sentences. By sharing stories together your child will learn
how stories are structured and story patterns.
Step One:
Step Two: Learning the individual sounds
• We talk about and share
books!
We focus on pure sounds not letter names.
• We act them out.
• We predict what might
happen.
• We think about how we
would feel if we were
that character.
• For example:
e is sounded as ‘eh’ not ‘eee’
f is sounded as ‘ffff’ not ‘eff’
• Once the children are happy using the sounds they can
begin to segment words within their reading.
c-a-t cat
Step Three: Sound talk
• The separate sounds (phonemes) are spoken aloud, in order, all through the word, and are
then merged together into the whole word.
• The merging is called blending, and is a vital skill for reading e.g: c-a-t = cat
• Children will also learn to do this the other way round. The whole word is spoken aloud and
then broken up into its sounds (phonemes) in order, through the word e.g: cat = c-a-t
• This is called segmenting, and is a vital skill for spelling.
• They will also learn that some phonemes are made up of more than one letter, eg: /ll/ as in
b-e-ll
Step Four: Sight vocabulary
• These are often called the high frequency words.
• They are the words the children will come across frequently and are difficult/impossible to
sound out. They need to learn these by sight and recall them quickly when reading.
• Use letter sounds and letter names.
• Write in lower case letters.
• Encourage your child to recognise letters in their environment; street
names, signs, packets, brand labels.
You will find many of your children are already reading as they
recognise these things:
It is important to use the phonics
resources that your child brings
home.
1. Most importantly read with your child. Make it an
enjoyable, daily routine that you both look forward to!
2. Sing an alphabet song together
3. Play ‘I spy’ using the letters that you know they have
learnt.
4. Play with magnetic letters, using some two-grapheme
(letter) combinations, eg: r-ai-n = rain blending for
reading and rain = r-ai-n segmenting for spelling.
5. Praise your child for trying out words or recognising
the words around them.
The Reading Bug is the one bug you want your child to
catch so how can we work together to catch it?
In school we read a variety of texts with the children. We
encourage you to do the same at home. Show excitement
around books and texts if you want your child to get this bug!
Sound Match
Children will have a selection of pictures,
individual letters and a missing letter
from a word. They need to match the
pieces together to make a word for each
picture.
Word building activities
Children will have a selection of sounds
which they need to put together to build
the word.
Word Match
Children will have a selection of
pictures and words. They need to
read the words and find the
matching picture.
Caption Match
Children will have a selection of
pictures and captions which they
need to put together.
Reading Books
Our reading scheme is in colours.
Your children will progress
through these levels at their own
pace.
Within each colour level there are
numbers 1-4. This enables the
class teacher to direct the
children to specific books within
their level.
Not all children will learn at
the same rate! Every child is
different and that’s what
makes your child an individual.
• Your child should be supported whatever their rate of
learning
• There is a very close link between difficulty with
phonics and hearing, so if your child is making progress
slower than expected, it is worth having their hearing
checked.