Teaching+Phonics

 ** __ Phonics __  **

** So what is Phonics? **

Phonics is an essential approach to instruction as it teaches children to read and write by focusing on the relationship of sounds and letters (Hill, 2006, p.208). Phonics is also a strategy for word identification and spelling. An awareness and understanding of the alphabetic principal is fundamental.  The **alphabetic principle** states that speech is made up of sounds which can be mapped into written letters (Hill, 2006, p.210). In the alphabetic code there are 26 letters however there are about 44 phonemes, which are sounds that create difference in meaning.  <span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)">Letter identification is necessary as children who feel positive in identifying most letters have a simpler time when learning the sounds of letters and spelling words. <span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"> <span style="color: rgb(47, 174, 249)"><span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)">Teaching children about mapping various sounds into different letter combinations is best utilised by doing problem solving activities. For example the word //giant// could be used to teach the /j/ sounds //g, j, dge// and //ge// and children could then construct lists of words that use these letter combinations (Hill 2006, p.210).

<span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"> The Content of Phonics incudes The Letters of the Alphabet and Onset and Rime: Stage 1 - The Letters of the Alphabet <span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> This stage involves recognising, saying and writing the letters of the alphabet <span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)">as well as the names and common sounds (Hill, 2006, p. 212). Within this stage children learn lower and upper case letters, consonant and consonant sounds and vowel sounds.
 * <span style="color: rgb(47, 174, 249)"><span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> Content of Phonics     **

Most children find consonants sounds easy to produce although the sounds /l/ and /r/ can be difficult as it involves curling of the tongue. Some consonants have soft and hard sounds eg. The letter ‘c’ word ‘city’ has a soft /s/ sound while it has a hard sound in cat. <span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)">

Stage 2 - Onset and Rime Word Families <span style="font-size: 110%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> This stage involves recognising ‘onsets and rimes or word families’  <span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> (Hill, 2006, p. 212). Hill (2006) states ‘The onset in a syllable is any consonant(s) that precedes the vowel.’ So the rime is just the vowel and consonants that occur after the onset. An example of the onset and rime would be a word like split, where the //spl-// is the onset and the //–it// is the rime.

<span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> <span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(30, 90, 241); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive">Onsets and rimes are a great strategy for children to learn new words as they are able to make analogies by using known words to discover unknown words. This is important when doing reading and writing as children can sound out unknown words by using similar known words.
 * = <span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> [[image:bat1.gif width="113" height="107" caption="b-at" link="http://gifsnow.com/"]] ||= <span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> [[image:cat.gif caption="c-at" link="http://gifsnow.com/"]]  ||= <span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> [[image:rat.gif caption="r-at" link="http://gifsnow.com/"]]  ||

<span style="color: rgb(229, 21, 202); font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"><span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive">**<span style="display: block; font-size: 120%; color: rgb(30, 90, 241); text-align: center">Practical Approaches **

<span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive">** Websites ** <span style="color: rgb(30, 90, 241)"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive">THRASS (Teaching Handwriting Reading and Spelling Skills) is a strategy used to train teachers to effectively teach Phonics to students. They use visual tools such as Wall Charts and floor mats. Visit the website at <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive">[|www.thrass.com.au]  <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive"> to view the brochure

Reading Rockets is a really helpful and informative site for teaching children to read. The section on Phonics includes instructional videos which are great as they show efffective phonics activites being used. Go to : <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive">[|http://www.readingrockets.org/article/3409] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive">/ to view the videos.

By using jingles, raps and rhymes teachers are engaging the students attention to phonics by making children aware of the sounds (Hill 200, p.239). The youtube videos below are are great way to teach children phonics as they engage the students and make learning phonics fun
 * Using Jingles, raps and rhymes**

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