Phonics and Reading

In this section you can find out about how we teach Phonics and Reading at Down Hall.

At Down Hall Phonics is taught systematically from Early Years to Year 3 and, where needed, in Year 4. We know that phonological understanding is an important part of the process of developing reading skills.

At Down Hall we use the DfE accredited programme AnimaPhonics. This follows the progression of Phases 1-6 of Letters and Sounds, with the following adjustments:

● Phase 5 has been organised into a sequence.

● GPCs that feature in the Year 1 Screening Check are taught at the beginning of Phase 5.

● Phase 5 now includes common prefixes and suffixes, to align with the 2014 National Curriculum.

● Phase 6 now includes additional GPCs and spelling rules, taken from the Year 2 English Programme of Study.

● Common exception words have been increased to include all those in the Key Stage 1 National Curriculum.

At Down Hall Primary School, we source books from a range of reading schemes including Collins Big Cat and Rigby Star. In Early Years and Key Stage 1 these books are colour coded into reading bands which include fiction and non-fiction books. There are also decodable Phonics books for the children in Early Years and Key Stage 1. These follow the different phases of our SSP programme. Whilst children are encouraged to make independent books choices when selecting their reading books, teachers ensure that these are appropriate. Each child has a bookmark of top tips and questions to support questioning when reading at home. Towards the end of Year 2 onwards the children are added to the Accelerated Reader programme where they take a half termly check to assign their reading level.

Skills Progression