Phonics
What does Phonics look like at Brill?
At Brill Church of England School, we believe that learning to read is one of the most important things a child will ever learn.
Reading opens the door to the whole curriculum, and strong early reading foundations give children the confidence and independence to access learning throughout their lives.
We teach phonics through Supersonic Phonic Friends, providing a consistent and systematic approach to the teaching of early reading from the beginning of children’s journey at Brill.
Our aim is simple: to ensure that children develop the phonic knowledge, decoding skills and fluency they need to become confident, successful readers.
INTENT
We are committed to ensuring that every child has firm foundations in early reading.
Through our phonics teaching, we want children to:
- develop secure knowledge of the sounds that letters and groups of letters represent;
- blend sounds confidently to read words;
- segment words accurately for spelling;
- recognise an increasing number of words automatically;
- develop accuracy and fluency when reading;
- apply their phonic knowledge independently in reading and writing; and
- experience success and enjoyment as readers from the very beginning.
We want children to see themselves as readers and develop the confidence to approach unfamiliar words knowing that they have the knowledge and strategies to work them out.
IMPLEMENTATION
Supersonic Phonic Friends
Phonics at Brill is taught through Supersonic Phonic Friends, our whole-school systematic synthetic phonics programme.
Children are taught phonics explicitly and systematically, with new learning carefully building upon previously secured knowledge.
Regular opportunities for repetition, retrieval and application help children to remember what they have learned and develop increasing automaticity.
Children apply their phonics through both reading and writing, helping them understand that the sounds and spelling patterns they learn are tools they can use independently.
Firm Foundations
We know that gaps in early phonics knowledge can make later reading and writing considerably more difficult.
For this reason, we place a strong emphasis on getting the fundamentals right.
Children’s progress is monitored carefully so that misconceptions or gaps can be identified quickly. Where children need additional practice or support, targeted teaching helps them to keep up and catch up, while continuing to experience success alongside their peers.
Our expectation is high, but our support is equally strong: every child can become a reader.
From Phonics to Fluent Reading
Phonics is the beginning of the reading journey, not the destination.
As children’s decoding becomes increasingly secure and automatic, their attention can move towards fluency, vocabulary, comprehension and the meaning of what they read.
This provides the bridge into our wider approach to reading at Brill, where children encounter rich texts, discuss ideas, develop their vocabulary and, importantly, discover the pleasure of reading.
IMPACT
We want children to leave the early stages of their Brill journey as accurate, confident and increasingly fluent readers.
Children should be able to apply their phonic knowledge independently, tackle unfamiliar words with confidence and have the secure foundations needed for increasingly sophisticated reading and writing.
Most importantly, we want phonics to give children something much bigger than the ability to decode words.
We want it to give them access to books, stories, knowledge, imagination and the whole of the curriculum.
Strong readers begin with strong foundations.
At Brill, we are determined to make sure every child has them.
Be Bold. Be Brave. Be Brill-iant.
