Phonic Teaching and Learning at Coley Primary

 At Coley Primary School, we use the Read Write Inc. (RWI) programme to develop our children’s phonic journey.   RWI is a method of letter sounds and synthetic phonics and it has proved to get children off to a flying start with their reading and writing learning.

Reading opens the door to learning. A child who reads a lot will become a good reader. A good reader will be able to read more challenging material. A child who reads challenging material is a child who will learn. The more a child learns, the more he or she will want to find out. At Coley Primary School we aim for all our children to become fluent, confident readers who are passionate about reading.

Children who read regularly or are read to regularly have the opportunity to open the doors to so many different worlds! More importantly, reading will give your child the tools to become independent life-long learners.

Using RWI, the children learn to read effortlessly so that they can put all their energy into comprehending what they read. It also allows them to spell effortlessly so that they can put all their energy into composing what they write.

When using RWI to read the children will:

• learn that sounds are represented by written letters
• learn 44 sounds and the corresponding letter/letter groups using simple picture prompts
• learn how to blend sounds and read words using Fred Talk
• learn that some tricky words with grotty graphemes can’t be read using Fred Talk – these are Red Words (you can’t Fred a Red)
• read fun and lively stories featuring words they have learned to sound out and show that they comprehend the stories by answering questions and discussing the text

When using RWI to write the children will:

• learn to write the letters/letter groups which represent 44 sounds.
• learn to spell words by saying the sounds in Fred Talk
• write simple sentences

We have put together a guide to how the RWI programme works together with some useful links. Scroll to the bottom of the page for Parent Videos on RWI Phonics.

At the end of Year 1, most pupils undertake a Phonics Screening Check.  More details of this can be found on the DfE Website.