Learning with phonics
What is phonics? | ReadwithPhonics
What is phonics? (UK)
Phonics is a method of learning to read. Phonics works by breaking each word up into it’s individual sounds before blending those sounds back together to make the word. Children learn to 'decode' words by breaking it down into sounds rather than having to memorise 1,000's of words individually. Research has shown that phonics, when taught correctly, can be the most effective way of teaching children to learn to read. Sounds are taught from easiest to hardest: starting with single letter sounds and then moving on to two letters making a sound and then three and so on. Learning phonics and learning to read is one of the most important stepping stones in early education as it gives your child the skills they need to move forward in every subject, you simply cannot progress without it.
All over the UK (and now in some primary schools in New Zealand and Australia), schools are using phonics as their preferred method of learning to read. Phonics was first introduced in the UK in 2012 and since then has had great results. Unlike learning words by sight and shape, phonics has provided students with the ability to learn a skill that enables them to work out how to read almost any word in the English language.
The alphabet is a great place to start learning phonics as if you learn the simple 26 letter sounds of the alphabet you will be well on your way to learning all 44 sounds. Our alphabet phonics song is a good way to learn all of the alphabet letter sounds:
Phonics Terminology
To start to understand phonics terminology its important to understand the difference between sounds that are said and sounds that are written. A sounds that is written is called a grapheme and a sound that is said is called a phoneme. Phoneme and grapheme recognition come hand in hand as your child starts to learn phonics they will make an association between the two.
For example when you write the letter ‘a’ this is a grapheme, it makes the short ‘a’ sound (like in ‘ant’), but when the short ‘a’ is said this is the phoneme.
The 44 sounds of the english language are not just made by up by single letters sounds, two letters can work together, sometimes three! These are know as: digraphs, trigraphs and split digraphs. A digraph is made up of two letters working together to make the same sound, for example ‘oa’ like in ‘boat’. Trigraphs are three letters working together to make the same sound, for example ‘air’ in ‘hair’. A split digraph is two letters that work together to make the same sound but are separated by another letter for example ‘i_e’ in ‘bike’.
There are some combinations of letters that sound the same but are spelt differently for example, ‘oa’ in boat an the ‘o_e’ in ‘bone’, both words have the ‘o’ sound but different combinations of letters are used. We call this alternative spelling combinations.
The sound that most children struggle to spot the most when breaking down words into its individual sounds is the 'split digraph'.
Like a normal digraph, this is when two letters work together to make one sound, however with a split digraph, they are separated and have a letter in the middle.
E.g. cake, make, bike, phone
Below is a little phonics codebreaker to help you remember the terminology.
The phonics codebreaker
Phoneme - a sound as it is said
Grapheme - a sound that is written
Digraph- two letters that work together to make the same sound
Trigraph - Three letters that work together to make the same sound
Split digraph - Two letters that work together to make the same sound, separated by another letter
If you are unsure of letter sounds, download Read with Phonics Parent Guide
What is the Phonics Screening Check?
The Phonics Screening check is a compulsory assessment that all children in the UK take at the end of Year 1. It is designed to make sure students have developed phonic decoding skills to an appropriate standard.
It was first introduced in 2012 and has shown promising results in raising attainment in literacy and reading.
The Phonics Screening check is made of up of 40 words, 20 ‘real words’ and 20 ‘pseudo words’. Each child reads the words and the teacher observes.
The question is, how important is the screening check to the child?
It can benefit the child by giving them a solid foundation of which to progress through school. If they have passed the screening it means they have phonic decoding skills that they can use to decode most words.
The importance of the check should be to make sure that a child is ready to progress into Year 2. The simple fact is, if a child can read, passing the check is easy.
Phonics in the USA
In America, phonics is taught a little differently to the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia.
Below are some of the key differences:
Short and Long Vowels: When a vowel (a,e,i,o,u) is followed by one consonant, that vowel is usually short for example ‘e’ makes the ‘e’ sound in ‘get’.
A vowel is long when it says its own name. When a single vowel is at the end of a word or syllable, it usually makes the long vowel sound, as in ‘go’ and ‘paper’.
Silent ‘e’: When ‘e’ is the last letter in a word and there is only one other vowel in that word, the first vowel usually says its own alphabet name and the ‘e’ is silent, like in ‘cake’.
Consonant digraphs and blends: In a consonant digraph, two consonants work together to form one sound that isn’t like either of the letters it is made from.
E.g.
ship
think
Consonant blends are groups of two or three consonants whose individual sounds can be heard as they blend together.
E.g.
clam
scrub
grasp.
Phonics in Australia
Phonics in Australia is taught much the same as in United Kingdom. The terminology and methods of teaching mirror that of synthetic phonics programs taught in the UK.
Phonics in New Zealand
Over the past decade, New Zealand’s educational system has favoured the whole language approach to reading.
This teaches children to learn new words based on context: for example, by encouraging them to guess a word in the book they’re reading based on the story, pictures, or words around it.
With a whole reading approach, children don’t learn to break down sounds individually, but to take words at face value and associate them with prior knowledge. If a child sees the word ‘dog’ written enough times with a picture of a dog he or she will then associate that word, in it’s entirety, with the idea of a dog.
But phonics is making a come back! More teachers are using phonics as a way to learn to read instead of a whole reading approach, as used by teachers in the UK and Australia.
Phonics teaching step-by-step | TheSchoolRun
Sort your phonemes from your graphemes, decoding from encoding and digraphs from trigraphs with our parents' guide to phonics teaching. Our step-by-step explanation takes you through the different stages of phonics learning, what your child will be expected to learn and the vocabulary you need to know.
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What is phonics?
Phonics is a method of teaching children to read by linking sounds (phonemes) and the symbols that represent them (graphemes, or letter groups). Phonics is the learning-to-read method used in primary schools in the UK today.
What is a phoneme?
A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound. The phonemes used when speaking English are:
Print out a list of phonemes to practise with your child or listen to the individual sounds being spoken with our phonics worksheets.
Phonics learning step 1: decoding
Children are taught letter sounds in Reception. This involves thinking about what sound a word starts with, saying the sound out loud and then recognising how that sound is represented by a letter.
The aim is for children to be able to see a letter and then say the sound it represents out loud.
This is called decoding.
Some phonics programmes start children off by learning the letters s, a, t, n, i, p first. This is because once they know each of those letter sounds, they can then be arranged into a variety of different words (for example: sat, tip, pin, nip, tan, tin, sip, etc.). While children are learning to say the sounds of letters out loud, they will also begin to learn to write these letters (encoding).
They will be taught where they need to start with each letter and how the letters need to be formed in relation to each other. Letters (or groups of letters) that represent phonemes are called graphemes.
Phonics learning step 2: blending
Children then need to go from saying the individual sounds of each letter, to being able to blend the sounds and say the whole word. This can be a big step for many children and takes time.
Phonics learning step 3: decoding CVC words
Children will focus on decoding (reading) three-letter words arranged consonant, vowel, consonant (CVC words) for some time.
They will learn other letter sounds, such as the consonants g, b, d, h and the remaining vowels e, o, u. Often, they will be given letter cards to put together to make CVC words which they will be asked to say out loud.
Phonics learning step 4: decoding consonant clusters in CCVC and CVCC words
Children will also learn about consonant clusters: two consonants located together in a word, such tr, cr, st, lk, pl. Children will learn to read a range of CCVC words (consonant, consonant, vowel, consonant) such as trap, stop, plan.
They will also read a range of CVCC words (consonant, vowel, consonant, consonant) such as milk, fast, cart.
Phonics learning step 5: vowel digraphs
Children are then introduced to vowel digraphs. A digraph is two vowels that together make one sound such as: /oa/, /oo/, /ee/, /ai/. They will move onto sounding out words such as deer, hair, boat, etc. and will be taught about split digraphs (or 'magic e').
They will also start to read words combining vowel digraphs with consonant clusters, such as: train, groan and stool.
Phonics learning step 6: consonant digraphs
Children will also learn the consonant digraphs (two consonants that together make one sound) ch and sh and start blending these with other sounds to make words, such as: chat, shop, chain and shout.
Encoding, or learning to spell as well as read
Alongside this process of learning to decode (read) words, children will need to continue to practise forming letters which then needs to move onto encoding. Encoding is the process of writing down a spoken word, otherwise known as spelling.
They should start to be able to produce their own short pieces of writing, spelling the simple words correctly.
It goes without saying that reading a range of age-appropriate texts as often as possible will really support children in their grasp of all the reading and spelling of all the phonemes.
Phonics learning in KS1
By the end of Reception, children should be able to write one grapheme for each of the 44 phonemes.
In Year 1, they will start to explore vowel digraphs and trigraphs (a group of three letters that makes a single sound, like 'igh' as in 'sigh') further.
They will begin to understand, for example, that the letters ea can make different sounds in different words (dream and bread). They will also learn that one sound might be represented by different groups of letters: for example, light and pie (igh and ie make the same sound).
Children in Year 2 will be learning spelling rules, such as adding suffixes to words (such as -ed, -ing, -er, -est, -ful, -ly, -y, -s, -es, -ment and -ness). They will be taught rules on how to change root words when adding these suffixes (for example, removing the 'e' from 'have' before adding 'ing') and then move onto harder concepts, such as silent letters (knock, write, etc) and particular endings (le in bottle and il in fossil).
Free phonics worksheets and information for parents
For more information about the phonics system look through our phonics articles, including ways to boost phonics confidence, details of the Year 1 Phonics Screening Check, parents' phonics questions answered and more.
We also have a large selection of free phonics worksheets to download for your child.
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Teaching phonetics at the initial and secondary stages of education
Teaching phonetics at the initial and secondary stages of education
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies the sounds of speech and sound structure of the language. You can learn to master the sound side of the language in any age, so it is necessary to pay attention to it already at the initial stage secondary school. Primary school age, according to numerous teachers and psychologists is a very important step.
Children of this age have high perceptiveness, which makes it easier for them to assimilate the material, also many of them have an interest in new, including a foreign language, here The main thing is to be able to maintain and increase motivation. GEF standards carry communicative orientation, individual approach, which gives great opportunities for instilling the interest and desire of the child to learn a foreign language. Many students are so passionate about the subject that they continue to study and to improve a foreign language all my life, making it not only a hobby, but also area of professional interest. Child's success in learning a foreign language language at the initial stage of education, in particular in the development of phonetics, in many respects depends on the professionalism of the teacher, his ability to independently correctly play sounds. However, I have a number of questions:
1) What is the essence of teaching phonetics?
2) How to determine the most favorable conditions for language learning start, and suitable methods?
3) How to identify barriers that may arise when learning phonetics?
Having answered these questions, I am going to identify suitable means to eliminate difficulties and fill gaps in knowledge of phonetics at students.
The main goal of teaching phonetics in elementary and secondary schools is the formation of phonetic or auditory-pronunciation skills.
Hearing-pronunciation skills are divided into:
- auditory, which involve the formation of actions and operations to recognize individual phonemes, words, semantic syntagmas, sentences;
- pronunciation skills - involve the ability to correctly articulate sounds and combine them into words, phrases, sentences. This requires the ability to place stress, use pauses and intonation;
- rhythmic intonation skills are knowledge of logical and expressive patterns of stress and intotones. It is this group of skills, and more precisely, their absence betrays us as foreigners. Practice shows that it is easier learn how to pronounce sounds correctly, than how to intonate correctly. So Thus, one of the most important prerequisites for communication is the development auditory-pronunciation skills, or the ability to perceive and correctly associate an audible sound or intooneme with its corresponding meaning, and produce sounds and intotones corresponding to certain meanings.
Violation phonetic correctness of speech, incorrect sound and intonation its design by the speaker leads to misunderstandings and misunderstandings on the part of listener. The most common causes of phonetic errors are: reasons:
- replacement of one phoneme by another: table - cable;
- as a result of incorrect syllable division: a name - an aim;
- as a result of incorrect stress: ‘import - im’port;
- as a result of using a different tone instead of the required one: peremptory Sit down (high fall) instead of the polite Sit down (low rise).
Teaching phonetics in general is an auxiliary character and is subject to the development of speech skills. The question arises as to whether whether to concentrate work on pronunciation at the initial stage or to conduct it in throughout the entire period of study.
Initially, as I have already emphasized, they are laid basics of speaking, listening and reading. Working on pronunciation is an indispensable element in teaching a foreign language and is an intensive character.
The development of listening and pronunciation skills should occur along with learning of language material. The sequence of introduction of sounds reflects functional approach: the first to master those sounds that are needed for pronunciation of the first structures, as well as the most frequent sounds, which allows quickly include structures and vocabulary in speaking and listening.
Average task stage - to prevent deautomatization of auditory-pronunciation skills, to maintain the achieved level their formation. To do this, when working on language material, you need to focus students' attention on the phonetic side of speech. Phonetics separate stages of the lesson are assigned, at which phonetic training or phonetic exercises are carried out. It does not have a fixed place in the lesson, it depends on sequence of performing those tasks where students may encounter phonetic difficulties that the teacher must anticipate and help students to avoid.
Phonetic skill - the ability to pronounce sounds correctly, to put stress where necessary; pronounce everything intonation correctly, etc.
Two methods are known the main approaches in teaching this aspect of the language. Modern methods training is based on a combination of these two methods. Let's take a closer look at them in detail.
Articulatory an approach.
According to this method there are three main groups of phonemes:
-- Coinciding in both languages
-- Mismatched
-- Partially matched
Most difficult to assimilation are the last two groups, with overlapping are the most difficult to grasp. Mastering their articulation is enough difficult task due to the fact that hearing the difference in their pronunciation for The untrained ear is a challenge. This applies to consonants and vowel sounds.
As for "thorns", then one of the most popular British phonetic courses and called "shiporsheep", which translates to "ship or sheep."
In addition to longitude and brevity, when working with English sounds, you need to pay attention to diphthongs.
It is very difficult at the initial stages of learning English to hear difference between a vowel and a diphthong derived from it.
Thus, the main the provisions of the articular method in teaching English are reduced to following:
-- Requires input phonetic course for the correct setting of sounds.
-- Every sound needs to be carefully worked out separately.
-- To be studied the work of the organs of articulation to ensure the purity of the pronunciation of each sound.
-- Shaping pronunciation and auditory skills must be produced separately.
Acoustic approach
In this case, the accent is put not on the assimilation of articulation, but on the perception of speech by ear, its imitation. Assimilation of speech takes place in the speech flow, based on repetition and imitation speech structures. This method is very good and justified in conditions of need. quickly learn a foreign language, immerse yourself in the conversational environment and survive in the country the language being studied.
This approach is pure form is not particularly good for a comprehensive school, since not all children have naturally good phonetic hearing. It is quite simple to explain or show in order to correct a mistake in those children who made it because of undeveloped speech hearing. Therefore, the most effective today in teaching English in schools is an approach based on a combination the approaches discussed above, or a differentiated approach.
Differentiated approach
In this approach, as in acoustic approach, much attention is paid to listening to authentic speech. This is supplemented by an explanation of the ways of articulating sounds, however, unlike articulatory approach, this happens without the use of terms, more in an accessible and understandable way. Since this method is typical for most schools and other educational institutions, consider the features the formation of phonetic skills at various stages of learning on his example.
Initial learning is necessary to build the foundation of good pronunciation, which involves correct intonation, observance of pauses, knowledge of the features word stress in a sentence and correct articulation.
It is necessary for normal the functioning of students' oral speech. Mistakes in pronunciation interfere the implementation of the main goal of the language - communication, i.e. mutual understanding.
For mastery the phonetic basis of a foreign language, it is necessary, first of all, to learn articulation pattern characteristic of native speakers of this language, that is, the position organs of speech at the time of the absence of articulatory movements.
teacher with help special exercises should ensure that the articulation pattern foreign language eventually became familiar to students, and they could even not to notice the moment of restructuring from one articulation mode to another.
Practice in speech communication reflects the degree of phonetic skills as integral components of oral speech.
Phonetic control skills are carried out when performing speech exercises in reading, listening, speaking and writing.
Form of control may become phonetic competitions for reading poems, playing short dialogues, tongue twisters and even phonetic exercises.
The purpose of phonetic charging:
- anticipation and removal of possible phonetic difficulties: auditory, pronunciation, rhythmic-intonation;
- practicing phonetic skills that were not enough formed.
The content of phonetic charging can be:
- reading words, sentences, microtexts, poems, proverbs, patter.
- reading complex parts of sentences, phrases from the beginning or from end.
- listening for errors.
- dialect recognition.
- definition of attitude towards someone or something by intonation.
- pronouncing the same phrase with different intonation.
- repetition after the announcer in pauses.
- repetition synchronously with the announcer.
- recognition of words by ear.
- recitation of verses, dramatization of dialogues.
At the initial stage, work with phonetics goes on continuously. students constantly listen to the sample speech of the teacher or speaker, repeat the samples, get used to intonation clichés.
Therefore, on the one hand, teaching phonetics on the initial stage is easier than the middle stage. Because in the middle the volume of reading to oneself increases, small passages should be read regularly texts aloud, and if necessary, work out the most complex and important phonetic phenomena at the pre-textual stage, paying attention to rhythmic intonation patterns.
Primary school provides basic knowledge, skills and abilities in all school disciplines, including foreign language. Scientists- linguists, methodologists agree that teaching phonetic skills in the initial stage should be given a special role. Knowledge and implementation of goals and tasks of state standards in the subject "English language", programs, which the teacher works, allow you to create an individual trajectory development of the language personality of the child. The teacher has the right to choose approaches to teaching phonetics skills.
When teaching phonetics it is considered appropriate to use technical means.
They give students sample for good pronunciation. Students try to imitate this pattern. speech and strive for it.
Hearing-pronunciation control skills are carried out when performing speech exercises in listening, in reading or speaking. And only in this case it is possible to objectively judge the the degree of practical knowledge of the phonetic side of foreign speech.
Literature
Anufriev A.F., Kostromina S.N. How to overcome difficulties in teaching children // Psychodiagnostic tables. Psychodiagnostic methods. - M.: Publishing house "Os-89", 2000. ¬¬- 272 p.
Watson E.R. Practical phonetics of English language. - M.: MIOO, 2009.- 56 p.
Galskova N.D., Gez N.I. learning theory foreign languages // Linguodidactics and methodology: Textbook for students. Lingu. Un-tov and facts. Foreign language of higher educational institutions. - M.: Publishing Center "Academy", 2004. - 336 p.
Oparina E.
A. Methods of teaching foreign languages in diagrams and tables: Lecture notes / E.A. Oparina; Ryaz.state.ped. un-t im. S.A. Yesenin. – Ryazan, 2005.
Solovova E.N. Methods of teaching foreign languages: Basic course of lectures: A guide for students of pedagogical universities and teachers / E.N. Solovova. -M.: Education, 2002.
Online courses in English phonetics - training from 15000 rubles
Why did we create the course “Fundamentals of Phonetics and Pronunciation. English language"?
Available popular textbooks and even university manuals, as a rule, do not tell about the difference between Russian and English [k], [v] and other, at first glance, similar sounds, what to do with our overvoiced consonants, why open and closed syllables, what long vowels really are and where they appear, and many other little things that add up to a tangible Russian accent.
The main goal of course is to help listeners improve the authenticity of sounding in English by analyzing and practicing those pronunciation differences between Russian and English that play the greatest role in creating an accent.
These features include:
- Incorrect implementation of front lingual consonants.
- Excessively voiced implementation of back-lingual consonants, absence of tense vowels in Russian.
- Palatalization of consonants, especially labials.
- Different degrees of voiced consonants in Russian and English and its influence on the duration of vowels.
- A fundamentally different implementation of word stress.
- A different approach to syllable division.
- Some intonation features.
We invite those who wish to immerse themselves in the secrets of English pronunciation in the online course “Fundamentals of phonetics and pronunciation. English language"!
The course is designed for practicing interpreters, translators and professionals who use English for work and want to improve the sound quality of their speech.
A complete set of handouts with videos of all webinars (sent to everyone after the lecture, regardless of attendance at the class)
Education according to the declared program with homework
Certificate in electronic form indicating the name, number of hours and a brief program of the course, with the seal of the company and the signature of the director
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Tatyana Yashan
Phonetics
Excellent well structured course. Sophia is just a wonderful responsive professional teacher.
Olga Abakumova
Phonetics
A very high-quality and useful course for everyone who wants to delve into the topic of modern British English phonetics. A lot of interesting material both for linguists who for some reason did not receive a phonetic course at the university (like me), and ...
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Olga Abakumova
A very high-quality and useful course for everyone who wants to delve into the subject of modern British English phonetics.
There is a lot of interesting material both for linguists who for some reason did not receive a phonetic course at the university (like me), and for a wider range of listeners, since the information is presented in an accessible and understandable form. Sofia is an excellent and very competent teacher, attentive to each student. I liked the chamber format of classes with a small number of participants. The only thing left to wish for is the creation of an in-depth course :)
Elena Gordeeva
Phonetics
I liked the presentation of the material, acquaintance with current changes in the pronunciation norm, a large number of practical exercises, feedback from the teacher. The course really allows you to improve pronunciation even for advanced users.
Elena Gordeeva
I liked the presentation of the material, acquaintance with current changes in the pronunciation norm, a large number of practical exercises, feedback from the teacher.
