At St. Bede’s School we understand the importance of teaching children to read as quickly as possible in order to help them enjoy and achieve to their full potential. In Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 we use Read Write Inc. Phonics to teach children to read through systematic synthetic phonics, together with some of the letters and sounds principles. At the core of the programme is the lively and vigorous teaching of phonics.
Children learn the 44 common sounds in the English language and how to sound-blend words for reading (decoding) at the same time as developing handwriting skills and spelling (encoding). Crucially, they read lively Storybooks, texts and Non-Fiction books with words they can decode, so they achieve early success in reading. The more sounds they know the greater the range of texts they can read.