Reading and Phonics

🔤 Phonics Lessons 

At St. Peter's, we follow the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised phonics programme to give every child the best start in early reading. This structured, systematic approach helps children learn the key skills they need to read and write with confidence.

🧠 What Happens in a Phonics Lesson?

Phonics lessons are taught daily in Reception and Year 1. Each session is short, focused and follows a clear routine:

• Review previously taught sounds and tricky words

• Teach a new sound (grapheme) and matching spoken sound (phoneme)

• Practise blending sounds to read words

• Apply by reading words, sentences or a short book using new and known sounds

Children also learn how to spell and write words using the sounds they’ve learned.

📚 Reading Practice Sessions

In addition to phonics, children take part in three small-group reading sessions per week with a fully decodable book matched to their phonics level. These focus on:

1. Decoding – sounding out and reading the words

2. Prosody – reading with expression and understanding

3. Comprehension – discussing the book’s meaning and answering questions

After this, the book is sent home so your child can read it again and celebrate their success with you!

📚 How We Change Books

We encourage a love of reading by regularly changing the books children bring home and use in class. Here's how our book-changing system works:

📘 Home Reading Books

• Each child receives a book matched to their reading level once they have read it at school in the sessions detailed above.  Your child should be about 90-95% confident to read the words without sound-talking every word. Practising at home will support your child's fluency and automaticity, so moving away from decoding or blending the words for reading.

• Children are encouraged to read daily at home, and we ask parents to sign the reading record after each session. These sessions will be totalled up on a Friday and will earn children points towards a bookmark.

• More information about reading at home can be found on the Little Wandle website.

📚 Classroom Book Boxes

• In class, children have access to a range of age-appropriate books.

• These are changed regularly by staff to ensure variety and challenge.

• Children are also encouraged to choose a sharing book to build reading for pleasure.

👨‍👩‍👧 How Can Parents Help?

• Read at home daily – support your child to read their Little Wandle book with confidence.

• Write in the reading diary each time you read with your child.

• Re-read books – this helps build fluency and enjoyment.

• Use pure sounds – avoid adding ‘uh’ to letter sounds (e.g., say "ssss" not "suh"). There is more information on the Little Wandle website to support the correct pronunciation of sounds.

• Talk about the book – ask questions, talk about tricky words, and celebrate progress. Discuss the characters, predict endings and talk about favourite and least favourite parts.

• Please see your child's class teacher for advice, if you are unsure about anything.