Monster Phonics
At our school we use the Monster Phonics Letters and Sounds systematic synthetic phonics programme (SSP).
This is a fully comprehensive programme where children start learning single letter sounds in the autumn term of their Reception year and it builds in progression throughout Foundation Two and Year One, preparing children for the statutory phonics screening that takes place at the end of year 1.
Phonics is taught every day and children learn to apply their phonics skills in reading practise sessions. This helps our children develop their fluency and comprehension skills.
Monster phonics draws on the latest research into how children learn best; how to ensure learning stays in children’s long term memory and how best to enable children to apply their learning to become highly competent readers.
Phonics begins in Nursery – daily ‘phase 1’ activities are introduced to embed the foundations for phonics. This will ensure children are well prepared to begin grapheme–phoneme correspondence and blending at the start of Reception. Our phonics sessions are taught everyday in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2.
Reception learn phase 2 graphemes during the Autumn 2, phase 3 in the Spring Term and phase 4 in the Summer term. Year 1 recap phase 3 and 4 in the Autumn term and then focus on phase 5 to prepare them for the phonics screening check taking place in the summer term. Year 2 recap phase 5 during the Autumn term.
Throughout the phonics programme, progress is tracked and monitored closely to identify children who require ‘keep up’ sessions. These short sessions will be specific to individual needs and will take place throughout the school day.
Children in Key Stage 2 will continue to receive ‘catch up’ sessions until they have a secure knowledge of phonic phases 1-5.
