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Additional materials for Unit 7.7: Early reading

1 The importance of talk for reading

2 Responding to texts

3 Phonic phases

4 The forty-four phonemes of spoken English

5 Articulating phonemes

6 Accent

7 Book selection: The level of text difficulty

8 The reading environment

9 Teaching contexts for more experienced readers

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The importance of talk for reading

www.education.gov.uk/schools/teachingandlearning/curriculum/a0068102/early-years-foundation-

stage-eyfs

The revised EYFS (Department for Education, 2012) recognises the importance of speaking

and listening to the process of learning to read. A stimulating and print-rich environment

can enable the exploration of imagination and reality. Through actively listening to stories,

children respond accordingly, and role-play, small-world play and child-initiated play will

help children develop their own narratives by connecting events in the world of stories to

their own experiences. Children need opportunities to play with language through

alliteration and rhyming in action songs, nursery rhymes and jingles. These songs and

rhymes echo children’s innate ability to play with sound from babyhood onwards. This

knowledge develops into an appreciation and understanding of the rhythm of spoken

language, of word order and sentence and text structure and speech patterns, so vital in

understanding texts.

This is not only true in EYFS, as all readers need time to discuss, reflect, raise questions and

speculate. This time needs to be planned for, but it is also important for a teacher to keep

a sharp ear out for incidental conversations during play, over lunchtime and at the end of

the day, and to interact with children when they discuss their experiences. These

interactions reflect children’s growing understanding and can be developed by the teacher

in future literacy learning and teaching. Such language experiences are vital in children’s

development as readers.

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For examples of how teachers can plan creative opportunities for talk to feed into the reading

process, read the case studies of Jump School and St Thomas of Canterbury School in the Ofsted

report Excellence in English.

www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/excellence-english, pp. 23–5 (sections 60–5) and pages 37–40

(sections 100–10) (Ofsted, 2011).

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Responding to texts

There are many frameworks to support children’s responses to texts, designed to develop children’s

confidence to share their understanding and ideas with others and to promote reading for pleasure.

Three are featured/discussed here:

1 Reading passports: Steve Willshaw

2 Booktalk: Aiden Chambers

3 Book-talk: Pie Corbett

Reading passports: Steve Willshaw

Rooted in Reading (Steve Willshaw, CfBT Education Trust, 2012) uses a series of reading ‘passports’

for readers of all ages – EYFS to KS4. Positive outcomes for these passports are reported, relating to

both the increased amount of reading and children’s enthusiasm for reading.

Willshaw also guides readers’ book choices based on flow in reading (i.e. optimal experience) by

McQuillian and Conde (1996), who concluded that intensely engaging reading experiences were

based on four identified factors:

the text should relate to a topic of which the reader has some knowledge;

the text should relate to a topic that the reader wants to know more about;

the text should relate to a topic in which the reader is interested; and

the text should relate to something that the reader would like to achieve.

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These are presented as a table to provide a sequenced approach:

http://stevewillshaw.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/20130531-181405.jpg.

McQuillan, J., and Conde, G. (1996). ‘The conditions of flow in reading: two studies of optimal

experience’, Reading Psychology: An International Quarterly, 17: 109–35.

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Booktalk: Aidan Chambers

Aidan Chambers (2011) gives a well-established Booktalk framework as a springboard for prompting

discussion about the books that children have read, in order to engage with and understand deeper

aspects of the text. Booktalk uses four basic questions for expressing ideas and for taking on the

views of others. Exposure to a range of different opinions extends children’s vocabulary and enables

them to make connections between texts and comparisons of texts.

Chambers’ Booktalk questions:

• Was there anything you liked about this book?

• Was there anything you disliked about this book?

• Was there anything that puzzled you?

• Were there any patterns or connections that you noticed?

These four basic questions are supplemented by ‘General questions’ and ‘Special questions’, to be

used as appropriate.

Chambers, A. (2011) Tell Me (Children, Reading and Talk) and the Reading Environment, Stroud, UK:

Thimble Press.

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Booktalk: Pie Corbett

As part of his Talk for Writing project (Department for Children, Schools and Families, 2008), Pie

Corbett incorporated and developed Chambers’ Booktalk approach as a key strategy. Corbett

highlights the importance of starting with quality texts to provide an open invitation to share

responses. This approach stresses the use of teacher modelling of thoughts, reactions and insights

into books to provide a thought frame (and then speaking frame) for children to adopt. Booktalk

uses tentative language to promote the discussion of a range of ideas, in which all responses are

valid, but subject to change through accommodating others’ ideas.

Corbett’s suggestions for tentative comments include:

• Perhaps …

• Does anyone else think that …?

• I was wondering whether …?

Corbett’s Booktalk general questions include:

• Have you read any other books like this?

• How did they compare?

• Which parts of the book stay in your mind most vividly?

• How did the main character change?

• What surprises are there in the book?

http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110809101133/nsonline.org.uk/node/163592

Transforming writing

Pie Corbett’s Talk for Writing approach features in Transforming Writing, a project designed to

develop a model for the teaching and learning of writing that more fully incorporates a focus on

embedded formative assessment. The interim report (Rooke, 2012) evaluates to what extent the

model of writing, which includes Booktalk, impacts on children’s writing in terms of ‘attainment,

confidence and engagement’.

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www.literacytrust.org.uk/research/nlt_research/5169_transforming_writing_interim_evaluation_re

port

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Phonic phases

The development of children’s phonic knowledge starts at a very young age, and continues throughout

childhood. Children must be able to hear and say sounds in words (phonemes) before they are expected

to read and write them. This important foundation for future success is crucial. The developmental

sequence below outlines the phases and stages of phonic development, showing how the skills of

blending and segmenting are continued into spelling investigations at KS2. This sequence draws on

Letters and Sounds (PNS, 2007), Spelling Bank (DfEE, 2001) and Support for Spelling (DCSF, 2010).

First phase

In this phase, children:

• speak and listen age appropriately;

• take part in meaningful conversations;

• discriminate sounds in the environment: e.g. listening walks, barrier games;

• play with language by exploring and experimenting with sounds and words;

• show an awareness of rhyming, onset and rhyme, alliteration;

• are immersed in a language-rich environment: songs, rhymes, nursery rhymes,

poems, action rhymes, ring games, counting rhymes, etc.

Second phase

In this phase, children:

• hear phonemes in words: first phoneme in own name, peers whose names start with

the same phoneme as their own;

• blend phonemes orally;

• segment phonemes orally;

• understand that words are constructed from phonemes, and that phonemes are

represented by graphemes;

• know grapheme–phoneme correspondences: know a small set of GPCs, e.g. s a t p i n,

from which lots of CVC words can be generated, introduced according to an agreed

sequence.

Third phase

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In this phase, children:

• blend phonemes in CVC words in meaningful contexts:

e.g. blend the sounds in cat when they want to read the word;

• segment phonemes in CVC words in meaningful contexts:

e.g. hear the sounds in cat when they want to write the word;

• learn grapheme–phoneme correspondences: more GPCs are introduced, according to

an agreed sequence.

Fourth phase

In this phase, children:

• blend phonemes in CCVC words: i.e. those with consonant blends/adjacent

consonants: e.g. frog, stop, plan;

• segment phonemes in CCVC words: i.e. those with consonant blends/adjacent

consonants: e.g. frog, stop, plan;

• blend phonemes in CVCC words: i.e. those with consonant blends/adjacent

consonants: e.g. best, soft, tent;

• segment phonemes in CVCC words: i.e. those with consonant blends/adjacent

consonants: e.g. best, soft, tent;

• apply this knowledge when reading and spelling unfamiliar words;

• learn grapheme–phoneme correspondences: know one grapheme for each of the

forty-four phonemes.

Fifth phase

In this phase, children:

• know alternative pronunciation of graphemes: e.g. ea in bead and ea in bread;

• know alternative spellings of phonemes: e.g. long-vowel phonemes: e.g. ay, ai, a-e;

• can read phonetically decodable, multisyllabic words;

• can make phonically plausible attempts to spell complex words.

Sixth phase

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In this phase, children:

• apply their phonic knowledge to read and spell an increasing number of complex

words;

• understand morphemes;

• understand affixes, prefixes, suffixes and root words;

• can spell plurals: –s, -es;

• can spell verb inflections: ed, -ing;

• understand syllables;

• understand homophones.

Seventh phase

In this phase, children:

• explore the relationship between spelling and meaning;

• learn that words with related meanings often have related spelling:

e.g., wise–wisdom, sign–signal.

In summary, by the end of Year 1, children need to learn:

• the forty-four phonemes and their corresponding graphemes;

• how to blend for reading and segment for spelling;

• how to apply phonic knowledge to reading;

• to use phonic knowledge to spell.

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The forty-four phonemes of spoken English

This list of the forty-four phonemes of spoken English, taken from Letters and Sounds, gives the

phoneme, then the grapheme(s), followed by some sample words:

Vowel phonemes

/a/ a ant

/e/ e, ea egg, head

/i/ i, y in, gym

/o/ o, a on, was

/u/ u, o, o-e up, son, come

/ai/ ai, ay, a-e rain, day, make

/ee/ ee, ea, e, ie feet, sea, he, chief

/igh/ igh, ie, y, i-e, i night, tie, my, like, find

/oa/ oa, ow, o, oe, o-e boat, grow, toe, go, home

/oo/ oo, ew, ue, u-e boot, grew, blue, rule, to, soup, through, two, lose

/oo/ oo, u look, put

/ar/ ar, a farm, father

/or/ or, aw, au, ore, al for, saw, Paul, more, talk

/ur/ ur, er, ir, or (after ‘w’) hurt, her, girl, work

/ow/ ow, ou cow, out

/oi/ oi, oy coin, boy

/air/ air, are, ear fair, care, bear

/ear/ ear, eer, ere dear, deer, here

/ure/

/ e/ many different graphemes corner, pillar, motor, famous, favour, murmur, about

Consonant phonemes

/b/ b, bb bat, rabbit

/k/ c, k, ck cat, kit, duck

/d/ d, dd, -ed dog, muddy, pulled

/f/ f, ff, ph fan, puff, photo

/g/ g, gg go, bigger

/h/ h hen

/j/ j, g, dg jet, giant, badge

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/l/ l, ll leg, bell

/m/ m, mm map, hammer

/n/ n, nn net, funny

/p/ p, pp pen, happy

/r/ r, rr rat, carrot

/s/ s, ss, c sun, miss, cell

/t/ t, tt, -ed tap, butter, jumped

/v/ v van

/w/ w wig

/y/ y yes

/z/ z, zz s, se, ze zip, buzz, is, please, breeze

/sh/ sh, s, ss, t (before -ion and -ial)

shop, sure, mission, mention, partial

/ch/ ch, tch chip, catch

/th/ th thin

/th/ th then

/ng/ ng, n (before k) ring, pink

/zh/ s (before –ion and -ure) vision, measure

‘Letters and sounds: notes of guidance for practitioners and teachers’, Primary National Strategy

00282-2007BKT-EN © Crown copyright 2007

Letters and Sounds

Articulating phonemes

When articulating phonemes with children, it is important to aim for a ‘pure’ pronunciation, which

omits any additional unvoiced vowel sound. For example, ensure you say ‘nnnn’ not ‘nuh’. This will

ease the practising of the processes of blending and segmenting. Please see ‘Mr Thorne does

phonics’, www.mrthorne.com, for models of pronouncing phonemes accurately.

Celebrating accent

Accent is unique to an individual. It indicates where someone comes from and can also reveal the

different language influences that individual has experienced. The variety and range of accents are

to be celebrated, and differences in intonation and stress in English accents make for interesting

classroom investigation.

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Ofsted’s (2011) guidance on accent is clear, ‘… some children in the north of England may pronounce

“but” to rhyme with “foot” and not with “cut”. Teachers need to be alert and sensitive to the

differences. However, the key point is that teaching starts with sounds and not with letters. The

teacher will know what letter(s) to teach to represent the sound the children say, even if it is not

what she says.’

Ofsted (2011) Getting Them Reading Early, Distance learning materials for inspecting reading within

the new framework, October 2011, No. 110122, page 18.

What is your approach to differences in regional accents?

Should a class teacher modify their accent if it is different to the accent of the

children in his/her class?

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Selecting books for developing readers: The level of text difficulty

When choosing books for developing readers, the children’s interests and enthusiasms will influence

the final decisions. Above all, teachers want to choose books that excite and motivate children.

However, when selecting books for children who are still learning to read, there are three levels of

challenge to take into account:

• Books that can be read correctly with no errors are ideal for reading at home or

in browsing time. This 100 per cent accuracy enables the young reader to

practise phrasing and fluency, reading with expression and enacting character

voices.

• Books that children read at 90–95 per cent accuracy are moderately challenging

and offer opportunities to use developing problem-solving skills and consolidate

existing reading abilities. Every book should offer a small challenge, with some

reading ‘work’ to do, but not so much that the reader is overwhelmed. This is

the vital ‘instructional reading level’ (Clay, 1993, p. 23) that reading schemes and

book-banding systems aim to achieve.

• When accuracy falls below 90 per cent, the young reader loses the support of

the text, because their efforts are directed only at word-level problem-solving.

Readers are not able to get the sense of the text and cannot determine whether

their attempts are appropriate or not. Young children who are emergent readers

should not read this frustratingly hard level, as their comprehension is known to

fall significantly.

An awareness of these three levels enables an appropriate match to be made between the child’s

current reading ability and the level of text difficulty. This should not be seen as a check on how well

the child can read, but rather as a measure of the skill of selecting an appropriate level.

Every effort must be made to prevent reading being seen as a chore and undertaken reluctantly and

mechanically, as this can impact negatively on the child’s view of the reading process, and also their

view of themselves as readers.

Clay, M. (1993) An Observation Survey of Early Literacy Achievement, London: Heinemann.

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The reading environment

Learning to read is a complex business. However, though complex, it is a game that everyone can

play. The necessary climate for nurturing and protecting children’s beginning steps into literacy is

one that promotes all learning in a safe and inclusive arena.

A rich and broad reading curriculum includes:

• shared reading, where the whole-class reading experience is one that is pitched

just above the children’s ability to read independently, so that progression can

be made;

• guided reading, where a group of children of the same ability read the same text

and have focused input from an enabling adult;

• individual reading opportunities, such as ERIC (everyone reading in class) and

DEAR (drop everything and read). Children also need time to talk about texts

and time to browse texts;

• building a community of readers by using techniques to extend the classroom

practice outlined above to create a buzz about books, through dedicated time

for book talk, teacher recommendations and displays of the teacher’s book

choices.

Bullock, K. (2013) ‘Building a community of readers’, The Reading Teacher, 66 (8): 631.

In A Practical Guide to Teaching Reading in the Early Years (1998, London: Sage), Ann Browne

recommends:

• Make links between books and children’s own experiences.

• Discuss the title, cover illustration and blurb to entice the children into the book and engender a

feeling of familiarity with the impending narrative.

• Provide children with sequencing activities related to familiar stories to help them identify key

events and understand plot structure.

• Produce story maps of texts used for shared reading to make the action of the story clear.

• Provide props that enable children to recreate narratives and create their own narratives

through imaginative play.

• Ask children to use previous experience to anticipate or predict key events.

• Encourage children to use the book’s illustrations as a source of information.

In what other ways can reading be promoted in the classroom?

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• Remind children to read beyond the unfamiliar word in order to get a sense of the whole

sentence.

• Ask children to read the sentence from the beginning if they get stuck on a word.

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Teaching contexts for more experienced readers

The teaching contexts for older readers require consideration of the shifting relationship between

being taught to read and learning to read, involving a degree of agency on the child’s part. Older

readers who have established strategies that enable them to monitor their own reading

independently can be said to have achieved a self-extending system of reading skills (Smith, 2004).

This self-improving system ‘… extends its own capacity’ every time the reader reads (Clay, 1991, p.

317). So, by reading more, children both consolidate the effectiveness of their existing reading

strategies, and gain the experience of increased competence and independence. They feel good

about themselves as readers as they get better at doing it! Clark and De Zoysa (2011) highlight the

dynamic relationships between attitudes to, and enjoyment of, reading, and how these factors

contribute to attainment in reading. However, these relationships can only flourish in a nurturing

environment that recognises the complexities of learning to read.

Reading enjoyment

Reading attitudes

Reading behaviour

Reading attainment

Adapted from Clark and De Zoysa (2011).

Clark, S. and De Zoysa, S. (2011) ‘Mapping the interrelationships of reading enjoyment, attitudes,

behaviour and attainment’, National Literacy Trust.

Smith, F. (2004) Understanding Reading: A Psycholinguistic Analysis of Reading and Learning to

Read, London: Routledge.