Phonics Intent, Implementation and Impact Statement 

Intent 

At Temple Grove Academy, we recognise reading as a crucial life skill.

We aim for children to read words and simple sentences by the end of Reception, become successful, fluent readers by the end of KS1 and develop a lifelong love of reading as they move through school.

We teach reading through Letterland which is a multisensory synthetic systematic phonics programme. Much research shows that well taught synthetic phonics opens-up reading and writing to children.

Letterland is particularly appealing to young children and has a good range of online resources available which makes continued learning at home easily possible.

We start teaching phonics in Nursery and follow Letterland’s progression, which ensures children build on their growing knowledge of the alphabetic code, mastering phonics to read and spell as they move through school.

As a result, all our children are able to tackle any unfamiliar words as they read. We also model the application of the alphabetic code through phonics in shared reading and writing, both inside and outside of the phonics lesson and across the curriculum. We have a strong focus on language development for our children because we know that speaking and listening are crucial skills for reading and writing in all subjects.

Implementation 

Through the teaching of phonics following the Letterland programme, children are taught the essential skills needed for reading.  Phonics is taught daily to all children in Reception and KS1.  Phonics teaching is systematic, engaging, lively and interactive. Each phonics lesson includes the following elements:

• Let’s Review
• Let’s Learn
• Let’s Practise
• Wrap it up

 All children in Reception and KS1 have unique Letterland logins which they can use to access Letterland’s Phonics Online at home.

In Reception, we follow the sequence outlined in the Letterland Phonics Teacher’s Guide.  Letters are taught in a sequence which allows for early blending to read words and segmenting for writing. Children must use the letter sounds in blending and segmenting and when looking at the printed letters. Character names are prompts and are only used when the character picture is shown with the letter.

Letterland lessons occur every day and must include a range of multisensory activities linked to the target phoneme. Magnetic letter rainbows and later whiteboards should be used in most lessons. Letterland texts must be read frequently in class before they are set as home reading tasks so that the children are already able to read them with a high level of confidence and accuracy.

In Year 1, phonics lessons follow much the same pattern as in Reception with a greater emphasis on writing sounds and words.

In Year 2, phonics lessons begin to give way to lessons focussed more on spelling patterns (including suffixes and prefixes) and grammar rules.

Impact 

As a result of high-quality phonics provision, children make good progress in phonics from their starting points.  Through the consistent, systematic, daily teaching of the Letterland programme, children become fluent, confident readers by the end of KS1.  Children can then focus on fluency and comprehension throughout the school.

Recognition of graphemes in isolation and blending in reading are assessed at agreed intervals using the Letterland assessment resources.  This allows teachers to measure the success of teaching strategies and identify any graphemes that need further practise.

Children are assessed at the end of Year 1 using the Government’s Statutory Assessment Tool known as the Phonics Screening Check.  This screening check confirms whether the child has learnt phonic decoding to an appropriate standard and will identify children needing further support in Year 2.