Our Vision for Early Reading
At Rhodes Avenue primary school we strive to ignite a passion and life – long love of reading in our young learners. It is our mission that every child learns to read. We believe it is their right to achieve this regardless of their age, background or needs. We teach all our children to become enthusiastic, confident and motivated readers.
We passionately believe that teaching children to read is one of the core purposes of primary school. This fundamental skill not only holds the key to the rest of the curriculum but also has a huge impact on children’s self-esteem and their future successes and achievements. Reading gives our children the ability to engage in a wide range of high-quality genres and texts, promoting a love of literature and an enjoyment of reading for pleasure and for information, as well as using reading to promote reflective thinking.
Intent
We teach children to recognise, blend and segment sounds, in order to read words, as well as reading sight words. We want to enable our children to become confident, fluent readers, who show an excellent understanding of what they have read.
How do children at Rhodes Avenue learn to read?
We have a whole school approach to teaching reading. We rigorously follow the Ruth Miskin, ‘Read write Inc’ Programme (RWI). It is a synthetic phonics and literacy programme which enables children to learn to read fluently (and at speed) so they can focus on developing their skills in comprehension, vocabulary and spelling. The programme is designed for children aged 4-7. Our teaching team, are trained experts who ensure that all children are taught to read at a pace that suits the individual learner.
‘Read Write Inc’ is a ‘rapid learn to read’ programme.’ ‘It is a carefully constructed teaching programme, alongside carefully matched resources and books. It provides a lively, structured, and rigorous approach to teaching of phonics, reading, writing and spelling.’
Five key principles underpin the teaching in all Read Write Inc. sessions:
Purpose – know the purpose of every activity and share it with the children, so they know the one thing they should be thinking about
Participation – ensure every child participates throughout the lesson. Partnership work is fundamental to learning
Praise – ensure children are praised for effort and learning, not ability
Pace – teach at an effective pace and devote every moment to teaching and learning
Passion – be passionate about teaching so children can be engaged emotionally.
Ruth Miskin website link where you can find more information about the programme:
Implementation of the ‘Read Write Inc’ programme
Progressing through the stages
The children in our nurseries start by experimenting with sounds through listening to stories, rhymes, poems and different sounds in their environment. They are also given lots of opportunities to explore oral blending. They begin the formal programme in the Summer Term. The children in Reception and KS1 have daily differentiated/discrete phonics sessions. This means all our children work through the programme at a pace that suits their individual needs. This also enables every child to have the opportunity to make rapid progress. Our phonics groups are very fluid and class teachers and support staff continuously assess the children to make sure they are in the correct group. This allows us to quickly identify any children who need additional support or more intervention. We are also able to identify children who need to move through the programme with more speed.
In the ‘Read Write Inc’ programme children learn 44 sounds which are taught in a systematic order. Children begin by learning Set 1 sounds in a specific order, together with rhymes to help children form the letters correctly and instantly recognise sounds. They also learn to blend sounds together to make words. This is done after learning the first five sounds through practising oral blending. When children can blend independently they progress on to reading green words.
Set 1:
Teaches sounds written with one letter:
We use pure sounds (‘m’ not’ muh’,’s’ not ‘suh’, etc.) so that your child will be able to blend the sounds into words more easily.
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
and sounds written with two letters ch sh qu ng nk ck (your child will call these ‘special friends’)
Once children are secure with set 1 sounds and they can blend, they begin to read ditty books.
Ruth Miskin ‘pure sounds’ video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yln6PpV1G1I
Set 2:
Teaches alternative vowel sounds:
ay ee igh ow oo oo ar or air ir ou oy
Set 3:
Is made up of alternative spellings of Set 2 sounds:
ea oi e a-e i-e o-e u-e aw are ur er ow ai oa ew ire ear ure.
Set 2 and 3:
Each sound has a picture and phrase to help your child remember the sound. For example: The sound ‘ay’ has the phrase ‘May I play? With a picture of children playing together.
Rhodes Avenue phonics documents:
This document sets out the expected reading progression within Read, Write, phonics sessions. The objectives (in the document) are set out as if children are achieving as expected throughout the year.
Read, Write, Inc. Whole School Progression 2025-26 – Half-Termly Overview
Please see the order/sequence we teach the sounds on this document. Sounds in bold print are additional to RWI. They are beginning to appear on the year 1 statutory phonics screening check.
Phonics sound sequence EYFS – KS1
If you would like more information about the year 1 phonics screening then please read this document:
Year 1 phonics screening letter
Who is Fred? How does he teach children to blend and segment words?
We use a toy called ‘Fred’ the frog. Fred plays an important role in our ‘Read Write Inc’ sessions. Fred can only say sounds so the children have to help him by saying the whole word.
For example, Fred says ‘m – a – t’ and the children repeat the individual sounds with increasing speed until they can say the word ‘mat.’ Children need lots of practice to become confident with oral blending and segmenting before they begin to read green words independently.
Ruth Miskin example of blending with Fred the frog:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEzfpod5w_Q
Reading books
Once children are secure with set 1 and can read green words they begin to read story books. In the ‘Read Write Inc’ programme each storybook is matched to the sounds they can already read, which sets them up for success and helps to build their confidence with reading. It is through the storybooks we teach children red words, which are irregular words that are not phonetically plausible and cannot be sounded out yet.
Every storybook is taught in the same way:
Your child will learn to read in a very simple way. They will learn to:
- Read letters by their ‘sounds’
- Blend these sounds into words
- Read the words in a story
The children read to their class teacher, nursery nurse or teaching assistant, every week. Children also have more opportunities to read in their daily phonics group. They read green/red words, participate in whole group reading or paired reading (dependant on their group.) This helps children to build their fluency and comprehension skills. They also benefit from paired reading.
How does paired reading benefit children?
The children work in pairs so that they:
- Answer every question
- Practise every activity with their partner
- Take turns in talking and reading to each other
- Develop ambitious vocabulary
How can I support my child with reading at home?
Please keep reading stories to your child every day. Ruth Miskin says:
‘Read stories to your child with feeling! The more you love the story, the more your child with love reading!’
The children have lots of opportunity to use the skills they have learnt in their phonics sessions and apply them in their language rich environments throughout the day. Not only do they use their reading skills at school, all children are encouraged to continue this learning at home. When children start ‘Read Write Inc’ story books, they are given this storybook to take home and share with their adults.
Ruth Miskin website link where you can find more information about how you can support reading at home:
http://www.ruthmiskin.com/parentsandcarers/
Read Write Inc. Phonics overview reading chart
‘Read write Inc’ Letter formation:
The children learn to form the letters which represent sounds (Set 1) with the help of ‘freeze frame’ pictures and ‘hand write speak’ phrases.
For example ‘m’ is the shape of two mountains and the ‘hand write speak’ for m is ‘maisy, mountain, mountain’
Document to support you with ‘Hand writing phrases at home’:
Read Write Inc. Phonics Handwriting phrases
Spelling for green words:
The ‘Read Write Inc’ scheme teaches children to spell using ‘Fred Fingers.’ The teacher says a word and then children pinch the sounds onto their fingers and write the word, sound by sound.
Step by step guide to support Fred Fingers at home:
– Consistently using Fred fingers for spelling:
- Say the word e.g. s-p-r-ay and ask the child to repeat
- Ask the child to:
– Hide their fingers as they count the sounds on them
– Hold up their fingers, palms facing them when you say fingers
-Repeat the word and then pinch their fingers as they say the sounds e.g. s-p-r-ay
- Ask the child to say the sounds as you write them. Underline special friends
- Ask the children to tick the sounds in their words
Ruth Miskin Glossary:
Pure sounds: is the pronunciation of each letter sound clearly and distinctly without adding additional sounds to the end.
Ruth Miskin ‘pure sounds’ video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yln6PpV1G1I
MTYT: My turn, your turn encourages children to hear and then repeat the correct sound
Fred Talk: sounding out the word before reading. Fred can only say sounds so the children have to help him by saying the whole word.
Fred in your head: children sound out in their head. This encourages speed and independence.
Green words: children can sound out these words using their phonic knowledge
Speedy reading: reading words with speed
Red words: Sight words that children need to learn
Sound blending: putting sounds together to make a word e.g c-a-t cat
Special friends: sounds written with more than one letter, e.g. ch, sh, ng , nk
Speed sounds: the individual sounds that make up words
Fred fingers: children use their fingers to help them spell decodable words
