Child

A child needs to form each letter the right way. Particular letters to watch for are the ‘o’ (the pencil stroke must be anti-clockwise, not clockwise), ‘d’ (the pencil starts in the middle, not the top) and ‘m’, ‘n’ (there must be an initial downstroke, or the letter m looks like the McDonald’s arches). The Jolly Phonics Videos, Finger Phonics Books and Jolly Phonics Workbooks show correct formation of each letter.

In time a child will need to learn joined-up (cursive) writing, which helps the fluency of writing and improves spelling, as words are more easily remembered correctly when they are written in one movement. Jolly Phonics uses the Sassoon Infant typeface which is designed for children learning to read and write. Many of the letters (such as ‘d’, ‘n’) have a joining tail at the end (an ‘exit’ stroke) to make it easier to transfer into joined-up writing. (You should check your school’s policy. Some schools do not teach joined-up writing to young children.)

3. Blending

Blending is the process of saying the individual sounds in a word and then running them together to make the word – sounding out ‘d-o-g’ and making ‘dog’, for instance. It is a technique the child will need to learn, and it improves with practice. To start with you should sound out the word and see if the child can hear it, giving the answer if necessary. Some children take longer than others to do this. The sounds must be said quickly to help them hear the word. It is easier if the first sound is said slightly louder. Try it little and often with words like ‘b-u-s’, ‘t-o-p’, ‘c-a-t’, ‘h-e-n’. There is a list of suitable words in The Phonics Handbook.

A sound that is represented by two letters, such as ‘sh’ is called a digraph. The child should sound out the digraph (‘sh’), not the individual letters (‘s-h’), so as to blend the sounds. A word like ‘rain’, for example, should be sounded out ‘r-ai-n’, and ‘feet’ as ‘f-ee-t’. This is difficult to begin with and takes practice. Jolly Phonics teaches the 42 main letter sounds, whether they are represented by a single letter or a digraph.

You will find it helpful to be able to distinguish between a blend (such as ‘st’) and a digraph (such as ‘sh’). In a blend the two sounds, ‘s’ and ‘t’ can each be heard. In a digraph this is not so. Compare ‘mishap’ (where both the ‘s’ and ‘h’ are sounded) and ‘midship’ (which has the quite separate ‘sh’ sound).

Some words in English have irregular spelling and cannot be read by blending, such as ‘said’, ‘was’, ‘one’. Unfortunately many of these are the most common ones. They have to be learned separately, and are called the ‘tricky’ words.

4. Identifying Sounds in Words

The easiest way to know how to spell a word is to listen for the sounds it contains. Even with the tricky words, an understanding of letter sounds can help.

Start by having the child listen for the first sound in a word. Games like I-Spy are ideal for this. Next try listening for the end sounds, as the middle sound of a word is the hardest to hear.

Begin with simple three-letter words such as ‘cat’, ‘hot’. A good idea is to say a word and tap out the sounds. Three taps means three sounds. Say each sound as you tap. Take care with digraphs. The word ‘fish’, for instance, has four letters but only three sounds, ‘f-i-sh’.

The Jiglets help in identifying the sounds in words. Rhyming games and poetry also help tune the ears to the sounds in words. Other games to play are:

a) Add a Sound. What is it if I add a ‘p’ to the begin-ning of ‘ink’. Answer: ‘pink’. Others are ‘m-ice’, ‘b-us’.

b) Take away a sound. What do I get if I take away ‘p’ from ‘pink’. Answer: ‘ink’. Others as above, and ‘f-lap’, ‘s-lip’, ‘c-rib’, ‘d-rag’, ‘p-ant’, ‘m-end’, ‘s-top’, ‘b-end’, ‘s-t-rip’.

5. Spelling the Tricky Words

There are several ways of learning spellings:

1) Look, Cover, Write and Check. Look at the word, to see which bit is tricky. Ask the child to try writing it in the air saying the letters. Cover the word over. See if it can be written correctly. Check to make sure.

2) Say the word as it sounds. For instance the word ‘was’ is said as ‘wass’, to rhyme with ‘mass’. The word ‘Monday’ is said as ‘Mon-day’.

3) Mnemonics. The initial letter of each word in a saying gives the correct spelling. For instance ‘laugh’ is learned by ‘Laugh At Ugly Goat’s Hair’.

4) Using joined-up writing also improves spelling.

Storybooks

A child will benefit greatly from a love of reading for pleasure. This can come, of course, from being read to. It will also help if the child sees adults enjoying reading on their own.

Once learning the letter sounds has begun, a child will be able to pick them out in words. It is easier if reading begins with storybooks that use simpler words, gradually progressing to books with more difficult words.

Jolly Phonics provides a thorough foundation for reading, spelling and handwriting. In an enjoyable multisensory way, it teaches the letter sounds – the basic units of English – and how they can be used to read and write words.

Research and experience show that it is easier and more effective for a child to be taught these skills explicitly, than to learn through storybooks alone. You can expect to see independent reading and writing developing sooner. What is more, with this teaching approach a child will be significantly less likely to encounter serious problems.

The material is suitable for school or home, and does not require any special expertise (though The Phonics Handbook is designed principally for teachers). The items can all be used together, or individually.

Jolly Phonics includes ‘look-and-say’ for learning tricky words such as ‘said’, ‘was’ and ‘the’. As children’s skills develop, they can start reading storybooks too.

A child will always benefit from plenty of praise and encouragement. It makes sense to be guided on the pace at which each child wants to go. If there is a phase when interest is being lost, it is better to leave the work for a while than to use undue pressure.

Below we explain the principles behind Jolly Phonics, so that your understanding of the teaching, and your ability to help a child, is much greater.

The basic skills for reading and writing are:

1. Learning the letter sounds (for reading and writing)

2. Learning letter formation (for handwriting)

3. Blending (for reading)

4. Identifying sounds in words (for writing)

5. Spelling the tricky words (for irregular spellings)

1. Learning the Letter Sounds

Jolly Phonics teaches the 42 main sounds of English, not just the alphabet sounds. These 42 sounds are listed on the back cover of each of the Jolly Phonics Videos, Finger Phonics Books and Jolly Phonics Workbooks and are introduced in seven groups of six sounds. Some sounds have to be written with two letters, such as ‘ee’, ‘sh’, ‘ai’.

For each sound there is an action to help the child remember the sound the letter(s) makes. As the learning progresses you will be able to point to the letters and see how quickly a child can do the action and say the sound. As the child becomes more confident, the actions are no longer necessary.

At first a child should learn each letter by its sound, not its name. For instance the letter a should be called ‘a’ (as in a nt) not ‘ai’ (as in aim). Similarly the letter ‘n’ should be called ‘nn’ (as in ‘net’), not ‘en’. This will help in blending. Later the names of each letter can be introduced.

The letters have not been introduced in alphabetical order. The first group (s, a, t, i, p, n) has been chosen because they make more simple three-letter words than any other six letters. The letters ‘b’ and ‘d’ are introduced in different groups to avoid confusion.

Sounds that are commonly written in more than one way are initially taught in one form only. For instance, the sound ‘ai’ is taught first as ‘ai’ (rain), and then ‘a-e’ (gate), and ‘ay’ (day).

2. Learning Letter Formation