Phonics
Phonics and Spelling
At Perton First School School we use Bug Club Phonics as our chosen validated systematic synthetic phonics programme. This breaks all the sounds children need to speak, read and write into phases. Each of the six phases builds upon the last to allow children to use phonics to pronounce, spell and break words down into phonetic sounds (phonemes) to read new and unfamiliar words.
Phonics teaching here is made up of a combination of recalling the phonemes (sounds) children know, learning and practising new phonemes, putting these into words (blending) breaking words into phonemes (segmenting) and reading and writing these words in sentences, as well as a range of games and fun activities.
Some words cannot be broken down like this and 'sounded out'. These are known as common exception words or tricky words. We teach these to children and help them memorise these right the way through to Year 4. These words become longer and more complex the older they get. In Reception they would be words like 'the' and 'to'. Further up the school they might be words with silent letters such as 'breath' and 'surprise' in Year 3 and 4. We will be running family sessions to help you support your child with phonics and spelling throughout their time here at Perton First. In the meantime, please speak to your child's teacher if you need help with this - they'll be only too happy to help!