Essential Letters and Sounds
At Harting C of E Primary School we use Essential Letters and Sounds (ELS) to teach phonics. This is complete systematic synthetic phonics scheme that has been validated by the Department for Education. Our chosen approach will support your child in making rapid progress in becoming confident and fluent readers from their first day in Reception.
We have fidelity to ELS which ensures that learning experiences the children receive are consistent across the school. As part of this scheme, children are taught through the use of fully decodable texts which follow the progression of sounds set out in the ELS scheme.
How can you support your child's reading development at home?
- To best support us in the teaching of your children, we ask that you read the decodable book provided, four times across the week. Spending 10 minutes a day reading with your child will best support them in their journey to becoming an independent reader.
- Staff will change the children’s books once a week. This allows your child to re-read each text several times across the week building their confidence and fluency. This is especially important as they begin to develop their orthographic map, learning that the sounds within our language can be spelt in many different ways.
It is a key part of learning to read that children re-read words and sentences that they can decode (sound out) until they are fluent (read with ease and precision). By reading texts several times children have the greatest opportunity to achieve this fluency.
- The books sent home are carefully matched to the teaching taking place in class. Using the books sent home each week, your child will be rehearsing the phonemes they have been taught in class.
- Any books sent home that are not yet decodable are sharing books intended to be read to, or together with your child. With these books we want to develop a passion for reading and would recommend talking to your child about what is being read and encouraging them to read the words they are able to decode.
If you have any questions about our approach, or would like further support in reading with your child at home, please contact the school to make an appointment with your child's class teacher.
Please see further details of the scheme and chosen approach in the parent presentation below.