What can I do at home to help?

In class, we have been exploring how to break words down into their individual sounds (segmenting) and how individual sounds are put together to form a word (blending).

Learning to read needs to be based on a solid foundation of general language skills.

These develop when a child has plenty of opportunities for speaking and for hearing stories, songs and rhymes.

• Segmenting instructions game - Please can you pass me the c-u-p? This encourages your child to blend the sounds to say the word c-u-p cup! Where is your c-oa-t? When segmenting sounds use the sounds that those letters make not their letter names. For example c-oa-t should sound like c-oh-t. Not 'see-oh-ay-tee' (COAT) as you cannot blend these sounds to say the word coat. 

        For example: 's-i-t d-ow-n' / put your c-oa-t on / j-u-m-p u-p!

• Use parrot talk (moving our arms like Parrot wings) to practise segmenting the sounds in words. For example: b-o-x / c-u-p / b-i-n. We focus on cvc words at the beginning (consonant, vowel, consonant).
• Practise different mouth shapes. For example: Looking at how our mouth shape changes and where we need to put our lips, teeth and tongue for different sounds. Try looking in the mirror whilst making these sounds: sh / weeeee / lump / push.