Synthetic Phonics information - Synthetic Phonics course

For teachers, teaching assistants and home-schooling parents who are teaching a child or children to read and spell but do not feel equipped with the techniques and strategies to help. Our new distance learning multi-media synthetic phonics course provides practical training in how to teach reading, writing and spelling using synthetic phonics either in school or at home.

Synthetic Phonics Certificate Course

Girl writing

Recommended by the US National Reading Panel for its systematic, direct method, Synthetic Phonics has become the foundation of the “Reading First” component of the “No Child Left Behind Act.” Children first learn how to connect letters or letter combinations with sounds, and then how to blend the sounds together to form recognizable words. They are then taught to sound out and blend letters to pronounce unfamiliar words. Synthetic Phonics rapidly teaches children to read within months rather than years.

PHONICS NEWS

Boy reading • Phonics: Reading Aid 'Brilliant' - A UK primary head teacher has credited phonics teaching with boosting pupils' reading skills. Children as young as three at Stoneleigh primary in Oldham have been learning to read through sounding out words for more than a year. Acting head Tim Renshaw said there has been a noticeable difference in the reading skills of his students. "It is most noticeable because we get a few new children who join the later years who have not used phonics and they have not made as much progress.

Teacher with children • Sounds Incredible - Once upon a time, in a deprived part of Scotland, a plan was put into place to wipe out pupil illiteracy within a decade. Ten years on, it's worked! It is mid-morning at St Mary's primary school in Alexandria, a bleak, post-industrial town north-west of Glasgow that often features on Scotland's list of areas of multiple deprivation. In Margaret Mooney's class, 20 five-year-olds have gathered on the floor at the teacher's feet, pretending to be trains. "Ch, ch, ch, ch, ch," they intone, small arms circling wildly like the wheels of a locomotive...

Books • Boys Do Better Than Girls When Taught Using Synthetic Phonics - Boys can learn to beat girls at reading if they are given old-fashioned teaching methods, claim psychologists. The use of more traditional phonetics-based lessons helps boys catch up with girls - even doing better on some tests - and prevents some children from needing 'special' schooling, according to new research findings.

Page of a book • Phonics Works Best Together With Whole Word Method - Reading specialists have often pitted phonics against holistic word recognition and whole language approaches in the war over how to teach children to read. However, a new study by researchers at New York University shows that the three reading processes do not conflict, but, rather, work together to determine speed.

Brain • Phonics Changes the Structure of the Brain -

The study reported that the brain function of poor readers actually changes to resemble the brain function of “good” readers when they have been taught to read through instruction that is direct, systematic, and focuses on the sounds and letters that make up words, the meanings of words, and helping children read accurately and quickly.

Using functional MRI scanners, researchers were able to document that effective reading instruction not only improves reading ability but actually changes the brain’s functioning so children can read more efficiently.

Books • Good Books, Good Readers - In the 2001-02 school year, Indianapolis Public Schools launched a reading initiative that used a lot more phonics in the early grades. The switch wasn't easy on teachers. It meant a different textbook, extra training, a more formulaic way of teaching. Their reading series, Open Court, wasn't all that changed. Specialists demonstrated strategies to use with urban kids who have vocabulary deficits. The school day was altered to give pupils more language arts time.

• Phonics the Tonic For Reading Rigors - 9-year-old Nick West is matter-of-fact about why he has a private tutor: "I had some problems with spelling." His mother, Anne Howley of Armadale in Melbourne, Australia, explains: "He couldn't spell anything more than a two or three-letter word. He couldn't spell 'this', he couldn't spell 'because'." Enter Noelle Michaelson, a retired teacher whose tuition begins with phonics: direct instruction in the rules for making out letters and mastering spelling. Tutors with this kind of phonics training are few in number.

• Schools Turn Page on Reading Instruction - The Greenwich Public Schools found that reading was being taught differently throughout the district. Schools chose their own approaches to literacy, which meant some had a more rigorous program than others. This year educators rolled out a single literacy program called "Phonics and Friends." It is now being used by every elementary school in the district.

Rose Report on Synthetic Phonics - Jim Rose

• Rose Report on Synthetic Phonics (Dec 2005)

"The approach which is generally understood as 'synthetic' phonics offers the vast majority of young beginners the best route to becoming skilled readers."

England's schools are being told to change the way they teach children to read, with the government calling for greater use of synthetic phonics. At the moment, guidance is that phonics should be used as one of four methods of teaching children to read. Now former OFSTED director Jim Rose has said phonics - where children learn the sounds of all the letters and combinations of letters first - should be taught "first and fast" to young children.

• Rose Report details, including a full copy (Click on 'Download the Report' and then on 'Open'; a little slow to download)

• Spelling Fad Cost Kids 14% Drop in Results - Dumping 1970s methods of teaching spelling, which included primers and graded workbooks, in favor of the "whole language" method caused primary school students' reading scores to fall about 14 per cent over 15 years. A study of spelling scores among South Australian school students over 26 years showed the need for the inclusion of phonics in teaching children to read, write and spell.

• Research Questions Phonics Policy - The UK research said synthetic phonics improved reading accuracy, but its effects on spelling and understanding were inconclusive. The systematic use of phonics teaching should be in "a judicious balance" with other elements, the report said.

• Scottish Schools Tune in to Phonics Success

• Teaching of Reading to be Revised - The national curriculum in England is to be revised so children are taught to read primarily using synthetic phonics.

• Phonics Teaching: a Child's Passport to Literacy - Systematic phonics should feature in every child's reading instruction and it should be part of every literacy teacher's repertoire, according to a UK Government-funded review of research by academics at the Universities of York and Sheffield.

• Inquiry reveals phonics hang-up - The Australian inquiry report, Teaching Reading, released in December 2006, called for the re-introduction of phonics as the foundation of reading, writing and comprehension. It found that children's progress in reading accuracy, fluency and spelling was significantly impeded if they were not taught phonics or were taught it in an incidental, unstructured way.

• UK Schools to adopt 'phonics' style of teaching reading - The education secretary, Ruth Kelly, today announced an overhaul of the way children are taught to read with a return to a "back to basics" approach.

• Head To Head Synthetic Phonics - England's schools are being told to change the way they teach children to read, with the government calling for greater use of a system called synthetic phonics.

• Q & A: Synthetic Phonics - A report today recommends a bigger role for "synthetic phonics" in teaching children to read in primary schools. Polly Curtis explains what phonics is and how it can help

• Phonics Alive and Well in Schools - Many schools already use synthetic phonics - a method of teaching children to read advocated by a government review.

•'Back to Basics' Seen as Key to Learning to Read - Primary schools should use a "back to basics" method of helping young children to understand sounds as a first step in teaching them to read, a government-appointed review is expected to recommend today.

• Synthetic Phonics Replaces Unsound Literacy Strategy - All 5-year-olds must be taught to read using a traditional “phonics” method from next September, Ruth Kelly said yesterday.

• Phonics a Hit in Wyoming Schools - Phonics is back in vogue in reading education, and one program being used in a handful of Wyoming schools - including Willard Elementary School in Casper, where Bush teaches - is proving a success.

Synthetic Phonics

• Australian States Back Phonics Push - Most state governments yesterday embraced Brendan Nelson's national action plan to promote back-to-basics teaching based on phonics.

• C is for Computer: ABCs Move Into the Age of Technology - Phonics is being taught a little differently this year in the Pine Bluff School District, as a virtual leprechaun named Clancy began administering phonics tests to the elementary students ... “I like Clancy because he teaches me,” said Chandler Tate, taking a break from writing his ABCs.

• Sound Advice on Literacy Scheme - A teaching method based on the sounds that letters make has received backing from Scotland's education minister.

• Ruth Miskin - Thriving against the odds - If Tony Blair claimed his three priorities to be "education, education, education" the headteacher of one of the most successful primary schools in England emphasises the importance of "books, books, books".

• Q & A: Synthetic Phonics - The UK government has backed a report that recommends a bigger role for synthetic phonics in teaching children to read in primary schools... This is good news for dyslexic children, who find great difficulty remembering words just by their look.