Learning phonics is a wonderful stepping stone to developing excellent reading fluency at a young age. The teaching of phonics has been adapted and continues to change to keep up with educational research. According to Sage Journals, ‘research has shown that systematic phonics instruction as currently practiced leads to better word-level skills’. Essentially, phonics is teaching children to decode the ‘sounds’ of the alphabet, alongside other identified sounds within the English language to begin blending these phonemes into words. Often, children will begin to learn phonics from their experience in Nursery and will continue to consolidate their understanding of these sounds until they reach the end of Year 1. There’s plenty of terminology surrounding phonics, including: digraphs, trigraphs, phonemes, graphemes and many more! As well as finding out more about how your child is taught phonics at school, there are also some amazing ways to practise phonics at home! Take a look at 7 fun ways to help your child to learn phonics:
1. Find the sound with a treasure hunt
Why not try a phonics treasure hunt? If you have a tuff tray at home, or small sandpit, you could create some arts and crafts gold coins with your child. Use the gold coins to write different phonics sounds and you can bury these in the sand pit for your child to discover. Once your child has found the ‘treasure’, it’s a great opportunity to practise reading the phonics sounds. You can even ask your child to begin writing words with the sounds they have found! Alternatively, if you are feeling very creative, you could create a treasure map for your child to discover the gold phonics coins around the garden. A phonics treasure hunt is a fantastic way to get your child involved with their phonics learning in a fun and engaging atmosphere.
2. Messy Phonics!
Does your child love messy play? Using a tuff mat, or outdoor area, you can use numerous different messy play items, like shaving foam, water (with food colouring), glitter, paint, bubbles and much more! You can hide phonics words within the messy play or encourage your child to write their phonics sounds using the materials around them. Messy phonics is a great way to encourage mark making and early reading skills!
3. Making a splash with phonics water balloons
For this activity, you’ll need water balloons and phonics sound cards. You can either place the phonics sound cards on a wall outside, or write the phonics sounds on the pavement using chalk. When you call out a phonics sound, your child will have to identify the correct sound by throwing the water balloon at the correct phoneme! You can make this activity easier or more challenging depending on the phonics sounds you have chosen. It’s a fun, creative and engaging way to learn phonics that your child will be sure to remember!
4. Fishing for Phonics Sounds
Once you have chosen a set of phonics sounds that your child can practise, why not create fish templates to cut out with the appropriate phonics sounds. You can attach a paper clip to each of the fish cut-outs and place within a tuff tray. Take a look at this link for more ideas about how to create your own magnetised fishing rods using materials from around the house! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErbM4I8655g This is a great way for your child to practise their phonics sounds with their friends, as well as enjoy some arts and crafts activities.
5. Online Phonics learning
Learning phonics online can be great way to kick start your child’s phonics skills at home. There are a multitude of online games to choose from, including https://www.phonicsplay.co.uk, https://www.topmarks.co.uk/english-games/5-7-years/letters-and-sounds, https://www.phonicsbloom.com/ and many more. Your child can practise saying the individual phonemes and blending their sounds together to begin reading words with greater success.
6. Going on a phonics forest walk
Going outdoors and exploring nature is a wonderful way to stay fit whilst taking part in purposeful learning activities. Your child could take a clipboard and pencil on your walks together and begin drawing the sights that they see. As part of their early mark making skills, your child can begin to write the initial letter of the objects that they choose to draw. For children who have a firmer grasp on their phonics skills, they can begin to sound out words and jot down their observations along their walk.
7. What’s in the box?
Why not surprise your child with a box filled with interesting and wonderful items? Your child could enjoy exploring the different items within the box and say the sounds of the words. This is another wonderful opportunity to inspire your child to learn their phonics sounds, encouraging their reading fluency and written skills! You could choose to fill the box with different objects and a mixture of sounds, or focus on one particular phonics sound, encouraging your child to spot the pattern!
