Children who read regularly or are read to regularly have the opportunity to open the doors to so many different worlds! More importantly, reading will give your child the tools to become independent life-long learners.

We can achieve this together through:

• Read Write Inc. Phonics, a program to help your child learn to read at school.
• Encouraging children to develop a love of books by reading to them daily, at home and at school.
• Giving children access to a wide range of books at school and at home.

At the Gateway Primary Free School, we use Read Write Inc. [RWI] to give your child the best possible start with their literacy. It is an inclusive synthetic phonic programme to teach our children to read, to write and to spell. We have adopted this as our whole school approach as the programme facilitates a systematic and tailored approach to learning basic sounds and letter formation before advancing to more complex sounds and reading for comprehension.  The programme moves with integrity from learning to read to reading to learn.

RWI sessions occur each day as the continuity and pace of the programme is key to accelerating the progress of children’s reading development. This method of phonics teaching is both systematic and repetitive in order to embed learning. The children work in small groups according to their confidence and competence. These groups are reconfigured on a regular basis in order to match the pace and the progress of each child; this reconfiguration also allows Class Teachers to identify where 1:1 interventions may be required in order to meet the expectations of both the Phonics Check and the end of Key Stage 1.

Children will have the opportunity to read and bring a variety of books home. We also supplement this with Oxford Owl, a website which gives children access to eBooks as well as their current Read Write Inc. book. 

Useful websites:

Please find a list of websites that you may find useful in helping you and your child to learn about phonics. Games and fun activity websites are also included.

• Alphablocks
• Jolly Learning
• Phonics Play
• BBC Bitesize
• ICT Games
• Starfall
• How to blend
• How to say the sound
• Ruth Miskin’s Youtube Channel

For further information please visit the Read Write Inc website.

What is the Phonics Screening Check?

The national Phonics Screening Check was introduced in 2012 to all Year 1 pupils. It is a short, statutory assessment to ensure that children are making sufficient progress in the phonics skills to read words and are on track to become fluent readers who can enjoy reading for pleasure and for learning.