Phonics

At The Dassett C of E Primary School, we consider that it is vitally important that children have a secure understanding of the letter sounds and spelling system of English. Phonic skills need to be developed in a systematic, staged approach in order to help all children to ‘achieve their potential’. Teachers at The Dassett implement exciting and interactive phonic sessions which engage all children in this area of learning.

• In Reception, the main focus of early reading and phonics teaching is teaching children the phonic sounds of letters, known as phonemes, and at least one grapheme to represent each of them.
   
• Throughout year 1, when children have learned the phonic sounds of letters, the focus of teaching shifts towards exploring digraphs and trigraphs (groups of 2 and 3 letters that represent a single phoneme) and that a single phoneme can be represented by multiple different graphemes.
   
• In year 2, there is more importance placed on learning spelling rules and reading. This includes studying prefixes and suffixes, and some harder topics such as silent letters and complex word endings.