Phonics is taught daily to every child in EYFS and Y1 and to children that haven't yet mastered phase 5 phonics in year two. We follow the Little Wandle phonics scheme in school.
Phonics Statement of Intent
Phonics and Early Reading Intent, Implementation and Impact
Intent
At Lakenheath Primary School, we believe that all our children can and should have the entitlement to become fluent readers and writers by the time they leave us in Year 6. For this reason, we have chosen to teach them using the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised Scheme which is a systematic and synthetic phonics programme. We feel this is best for our children and was the natural progression from the Letters and Sounds scheme that we were previously using. We start teaching it in Reception and it builds upon their knowledge as the children progress through Year 1 and beyond if required.
We also use the same alphabetic code to model the application through phonics in shared reading and writing in all lessons in KS1, utilising the same resources so our children become as familiar as possible with the language and mantras therefore becoming embedded throughout their school day.
Implementation
Daily Phonics Lessons in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2* (*as required)
At Lakenheath, we teach daily phonics lessons.
In Reception, a 20 – 30 minute lesson is taught each day starting in the Autumn Term.
In our mixed ability Year 1 and 2 class, 30 minute lessons are taught each morning track.
Children in Reception are taught to read and spell words using Phase 2 and 3 GPC’s and words with adjacent consonants (Phase 4) with fluency.
Children in in our mixed ability Year 1 and 2 class are taught to read and spell words using Phase 5 GPC’s with fluency.
Daily Keep-up lessons
At Lakenheath, we use the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised Assessment Tracker to keep up to date on the children’s progress. From this we are able to see if there are any children who require a little extra support. If they do, we run Keep-up lessons, three times each week by a fully trained member of staff. The lessons reflect the way the class phonics session is taught, uses the same mantras and uses the same resources, but they are in smaller steps with more repetition.
For any child in Year 3 who is not a secure reader, we teach phonics for the Autumn Term and then provide catch-up sessions three times each week. We also provide catch-up sessions for any child in KS2 where the lessons are delivered with pace.
Reading Sessions
At Lakenheath, we teach our children to read in small groups three times each week where we focus on specific areas: Decoding, Prosody and Comprehension. All books are matched to the children’s phonic knowledge and it is then taken home in order for our children to continue practicing.
No-Nonsense Spelling and Accelerated Reader
For those children in Year 2 who have passed the Phonics Screening Check and are reading with fluency, they will be taught using the No Nonsense Spelling Scheme and use the Accelerated Reader programme in order to continue to develop their language skills.
Impact
We will assess the children in different ways in order to keep on top of their understanding and in order to ascertain the children who require Catch-Up or Keep-Up sessions.
Staff will undertake assessment during each lesson and during the review lesson each Friday to check for any gaps and address these immediately.
Every six weeks, teachers will assess every child and Heat Maps will be produced. This will inform us of the progress the children are making and will check the level of the book the children are reading is correct.
The Heat Maps will be scrutinised by SLT in order to narrow attainment gaps and for any extra staff to be put in place if this is a requirement.
The Phonics Screening Check will be carried out for children in Year 1 and for those children in Year 2 who need to re-sit.