Phonics in the Foundation Stage (Ages 3 to 5)
Phonics is the relationship between sounds (phonemes) and letters or groups of
letters (graphemes). Learning phonics involves listening to sounds, recognising
sounds and discriminating between sounds as well as learning how sounds are
represented by letters.
When first learning phonics, children should have many opportunities to enjoy
listening to and reading stories, poems, songs and rhymes, as well as information
books about topics that interest them.
How this book is organised
Letters of the alphabet (p. 6-13) introduces upper- and lower-case letters, in
order, by name. You could use these terms with your child or capital letters' and
"lower-case letters' (as there is no other simple term for "lower-case'*). The letters
are introduced in a way that helps children learn letter formation as well as
position in the alphabet.
There are further activities on the letters of the alphabet at later stages of the
book (p. 28-29, 58-59),.
Initial letters of words introduces the sounds the letters represent in very short
words in a similar order to that used in most schools. The most common sound is
introduced for each letter. Most children notice the first sound of a word more
easily than the others. Alternative sounds for each letter come later.
Middle sounds focuses on the middle vowel sound (a, e, i, o, u) of three-letter
words that begin and end with a consonant. The activities use the most common
sound for each vowel, i.e. the short vowel sounds 'a' as in cat, 'e' as in get, "i' as in
pin, 'O' as in hot and 'u' as in cup. Alternative sounds for these letters come later.
Two consonants - one sound introduces pairs of consonants that together stand
for a single sound: 'k' as in sock, 'ff' as in cuff, 'Il' as in tell, 'ch' as in chop, 'sh'
as in ship or fish, 'th as in the, moth, path and with, and 'ng' at the end of words
like sing. (Note that ng is not separated into n-g.) Other ch sounds come later. It
is helpful to use the term 'two letters one sound' with children, so that they know
that they should sound the two letters as one, rather than separately.
Consonant beginnings and endings introduces the more difficult and less
commonly used consonants, some of which do not occur at the beginning of
words: j, V, W, X, y, z. It also introduces zz and qu, since zz is more common than z
at the ends of words and q is not used alone in English words.
Two vowels - one sound introduces some vowel sounds that are represented by
two letters: ee, ai, 0o, oa, ar, or, ur, ow, oi, er. Only one vowel sound (the simplest
or most common) is used for each. Other vowel sounds for these pairs of letters
come later, as do other ways of spelling the same vowel sounds.
Three vowels - one sound introduces vowel sounds represented by three letters:
ear, ure, igh. Only one vowel sound (the simplest or most common) is used for
each. Other vowel sounds for these sets of letters come later, as do other ways of
spelling the same vowel sounds.
Consonant blends are groups of consonants that are sounded separately in a word
and then blended to spell or say the word. The consonants is used in this way in many
words: for example, st, sn, sw, sk, sp, sn, si. Other blended consonants introduced here
are bl, fl, pl, cl, pr, br. tr, gr dr, cr, and, at the ends of words It, Ik, Im, Ib, if, Ik, lp, nd, nt, nk.
What have I learned?
This section provides activities to help you and your child assess what has
been learned. There are no pictures to use as clues - your child will use phonic
knowledge only to read the words.
You can download this book as a printable PDF file there 👆
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