Here is our latest tutorial explaining the term ‘grapheme’. This tutorial is aimed at teachers, teaching assistants and parents helping children learn to read with phonics. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsWtyKqpHko
Read MoreApproaches to Teaching Reading
Phonic Books for catch-up readers presentation
Here is a presentation about our phonic books for catch-up readers. It explains why older, struggling readers need age-appropriate phonic reading books and presents the special features that will help catch-up readers learn to read. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_VkiZBxAnY
Read MoreDe-misty-fying spelling by John Walker
John Walker of Sounds-Write argues that our spelling system is, in fact, phonetic despite what some lecturers maintain. http://literacyblog.blogspot.co.uk/
Read MoreWhy students don’t remember what they have been taught
Here a thoughtful article by Joe Kirby about why our pupils often don’t remember what they have been taught. It is mainly relevant to the secondary curriculum – but also has important implications for SEN. For example – why do our pupils find punctuation so difficult to remember? It explains the important role of overlearning, […]
Read MoreSynthetic Phonics tutorial
We have just made a free tutorial for teachers, teaching assistants and parents about Synthetic Phonics. It explains why the English language is difficult to learn to read and spell and why Synthetic Phonics is the most effective method to teach children reading and spelling. It also touches upon the role that decodable books have in […]
Read MoreNow I know why I wasn’t taught how to teach reading
Thank you Susan Godsland from www.dyslexics.org.uk for flagging up an interesting summary by Spelfabet (www.spelfabet.com.au) of an article by Mark S. Seidenberg: ‘The Science of Reading and its Educational Implications’. This is a useful summary for busy teachers as it raises some really important issues: 1. The rift between the scientific research academic approach and […]
Read MoreWhat is so great about dictation?
I have been working with an 8 year old pupil on the spelling ‘ck’. We also need to revisit ‘sh, ch and th’ which she tends to forget and confuse. Every week we do a bit of dictation including the graphemes we need to revise. This dictation is based on a Dandelion Launcher book ‘Which Shall I […]
Read MoreWho’s afraid of dictation?
Phonic Books has just published a new workbook , the ‘Dandelion Book of Dictation’. It consists of dictation and punctuation exercises which follow the progression of the Dandelion Books reading scheme, Units 1-20. Yes, we love dictation. It is a really useful way to get children to practise spelling words and sentences as they develop their reading. It […]
Read MoreQuality of teaching = quality of training
Read the feedback from a recent Sounds-Write course given by John Walker and Mary Gladstone in Perth, Australia. That is just how I felt when I attended the course! http://topnotchteaching.com/lesson-ideas/teach-children-to-read/ To find out more about Sounds-Write visit: http://www.sounds-write.co.uk/
Read MoreWhole Language – The Medusa’s head
Read this informative post by Susan Godsland on the Reading Reform message board on the multiple lives of ‘whole language’ approach to reading despite having poor evidence to back its efficacy. http://www.rrf.org.uk/messageforum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=5360
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