Z- Special Needs and JP.pdf - Primarily Learning

Jolly Phonics and Special Needs Children
Approximately 25% of children find learning to read and write very easy. They have a good memory
for symbols and words. They are also naturally able to hear the sounds in words, which enables them
to crack the alphabetic code by themselves. These children will read and write whatever method is
used to teach them. At the other end of the spectrum approximately 25% of children do not have these
attributes and find it very difficult. These children need to have their problems recognised and given
extra support.
Initially it is important to find out what the problems are. With synthetic phonics there is a certain body
of knowledge that has to be learnt, along with the skills of blending for reading, and segmenting for
spelling.
Facts to find out about the five basic skills:
Letter sounds
Formation
Blending
Identifying sounds in
words
Tricky words
What letter sounds can be instantly recognised and written
from memory?
What letters are formed correctly each time?
Can short words be identified when the teacher says the
sounds?
Can the child work out simple words by saying the sounds of
the letters and blending them? E.g. c-a-t is cat.
Can the child identify the sounds in simple spoken words.
E.g. the word cat has the sounds /c/ /a/ and /t/ in it.
What tricky words are instantly recognised for reading?
What tricky words can be spelt accurately?
The Jolly Phonics Checklist (On the Extra Resources CD) is a useful guide and can be used to
record progress.
Short regular sessions tend to be the most effective when helping children to catch up. Knowledge
tends to be forgotten when there is too long a gap between sessions.
Occasionally a child can read the words but does not understand the text. If this is the case then
the child should be given text that is intellectually simpler. The problem, in most cases, is the poor
ability to fluently decode unfamiliar words. For this type of difficulty it is important to concentrate
on the five basic skills only. It works well to do a bit of each skill in every session, with groups of 3
or 4 children. Parental support, if it is at all possible, is extremely valuable and well worth
cultivating. Naturally repeating the same skills can become boring and fail to capture the children’s
interest, which is why it is important to find different ways of doing the same things. The following
activities are examples of this.
Sue Lloyd – Jolly Learning 1

Letter Sounds
Flash cards – revise with actions and without actions (avoid having too many that are totally
unknown – build up gradually as you teach the unknown ones)
Pouncing game – lay letter sound flash cards on table (face up) – call out a sound and see
who can bang their hand on it first.
Pass the letter sound – call out a letter sound and ask one child to give it to another in the
group or to you.
Pairs Game – lay the cards face down – as the child turns a card over he/she says the sound
– if correct he/she keeps the pair and has another go (useful for reinforcing and developing
fluency rather than learning. On the whole it is too time consuming for the intervention session
but useful for homework with a parent, or in the classroom with a child who knows the letter
sounds well).
Snap – make sure each child has the same letter sounds in their pack – ask them to say the
sound as they turn the letter over and then ‘Snap’ if the sounds are the same. The first to say
‘Snap’ gets all the cards (similar to Pairs for reinforcing, and practising at a different time to
the intervention session)
Formation
Air writing – children form letter in the air either by following the teacher’s example or in
response to the letter being called out.
Dictation of letter sounds - call out letter sounds for the children to write – check for correct
formation (writing them and saying the sounds at the same time not only helps the children to
write them it also helps them to recognise the letter sounds more fluently – both essential
skills). The children can write on white boards, plain paper or paper with lines that guide and
develop correct proportion and neat handwriting (dependent on the age and dexterity of the
child).
Sand writing – put sand on the shiny lid of a large biscuit tin – child forms letter with finger and
exposes the shiny surface (particularly for a child who keeps getting the formation wrong).
Feel the shape – either use the cut out grooves in the Finger Phonics books or sandpaper
letters (Montessori idea)
Blending – hearing the word when an adult says the sounds
Which one is it? – put three simple cvc objects or pictures in front of the child(ren) e.g. book,
hat, pen (cvc cards available from LDA!) Then say ‘Which one is the h-a-t? Gradually, after
succeeding at this, increase the difficulty e.g. have more objects/pictures to choose from: hold
card so child cannot see it and say the sounds – child says word and you turn the card round
to show whether correct or not.
Where in the picture? – pick out simple objects from the picture and say the sounds e.g. ‘Who
can see the d-o-g?’
Find on your body? – Where is your l-e-g? (ar-m, h-ea-d, f-oo-t, n-e-ck, h-a-n-d, t-oe-z, kn-ee
etc.)
My turn, your turn – have set of 10 (approx) short words – say sounds in each word and give
answer e.g. m-a-n man (move pointed finger as you say each sound and your run finger along
imaginary word when you say the word). Then children repeat what you have just modelled.
The finger movements are to keep the children in unison.
Sue Lloyd – Jolly Learning 2

Blending words
Word Bank – prepare sets of words for blending e.g. cvc regular words that use the first 6
letter sounds, cvc regular words that use the first 12 letter sounds etc., sets of regular words
that have initial consonant blends, sets of words that have the /ai/ sound but are spelt with the
3 alternative ways of writing them (‘ai’ words on green paper, ‘ay’ words on blue and ‘a-e’
words on pink paper – different colours make it easier to keep organised) etc.
Who gets it first? – hold up flash card of a regular word. The first one to read it gets it. Count
up at the end to find out who the winner is.
Consonant and short vowel blending (for children who are slow at blending, or who find it
difficult to hear the word when they have said the sounds) – have plenty of cards with a
consonant and a short vowel on them (see Jolly Extra Materials disk) – the child has to pick it
up, blend it, and keep it if it is correct. The child with the most cards is the winner. When
appropriate, progress to cards with consonant blends and short vowels, then digraphs and
short vowels and after that with long vowels.
Cut the word – provide words for the children to cut up into their individual sounds (with
scissors or pencil line) e.g. ‘bat’ bat, ‘spell’ spell, ‘train’ train, ‘supper’ supper,
‘shadow’ shadow – making sure the digraphs have been taught, such as the /ow/ in
shadow.
Blending long words – as early as possible encourage the children to enjoy working out long
words by blending the beginning of the words and then adding the other sounds from left to
right, or seeing if they can get the word that you are writing before you have come to the end
of writing it. Use words like ‘carpet, cobweb, magnet, carrot, bumpy, dustbin, chatterbox,
popcorn, September etc.’
Identifying the sounds in words
Phoneme fingers – call out simple short words for the children to call out the sounds in the
words – holding up a finger for each sound/phoneme.
My turn, your turn - have a set of 10 (approx) short words – say the word and then say each
sound e.g. leg… l-e-g (move hand in a vertical straight position along the imaginary word and
then go back and make a downward movement for each sound as you say it). Then the
children repeat what you have just modelled by themselves. You use the hand movements to
keep the children in unison.
Building words – provide a card with three dashes on it and a set of letters e.g. h,o,t,i,p,n. Call
out the word ‘hot’. The child or children have to think of the sounds in the word and pick up the
letters for those sounds and lay them in the left to right order on the dashes. Another child
could be asked to change the word from ‘hot’ to ‘hit’ – this continues with the words pit, pin,
fin, fit and back to ‘hot’.
Magnetic Letters or Letter Sound Board – vowels at the top of the board and some
consonants at the bottom – simple words are called out for a child to build in the middle.
Group Word Building – deal out letter sound cards – each child lays their cards in front of
them and, in turn, identifies the letter sounds they were given. The teacher calls out a word
and the child who has the letter or digraph for the first sound lays it in the middle, then the
child with letter or digraph for the second sound puts it next to the first – continue until the
word is completed.
Sue Lloyd – Jolly Learning 3

Dictation – call out sounds for the children to write the letters for those sounds (close
together), such as d o g (as extra interest use sounds that make a word) and see which child
is the fastest at working out the word).
Word Dictation – call out words for the children to write.
Sentence Dictation – call out sentences for the children to write. The sentences should consist
of regular words that can be written by listening for the sounds and tricky words that have
been taught.
Tricky Words – for reading
Learning Correct Pronunciation – sound out (blend) unknown tricky words and then teach the
correct pronunciation e.g. w-a-s when blended gives ‘was’ (rhymes with mass) and the real
pronunciation is ‘was’ (woz). After that give plenty of practice.
Say Correct Pronunciation – the teacher says the tricky word as it should be pronounced e.g.
‘was’ (to rhyme with mass) and the children chant the proper word ‘was’ (woz).
Flash Cards – quickly hold up the cards and revise the words that have been taught. Put the
fairly well known tricky words in a box/envelope and send home for revision. The aim is to
improve fluency at saying the words.
Pouncing Game – play in the same way as the Letter Sound Pouncing Game – except use
tricky words instead of letter sound cards. Alternatively write tricky words on pieces of paper
and space them out on the floor. The first child to jump on the correct word, after the teacher
has called it out, gets a point. The child with the most points is the winner.
Tricky Words – for spelling
(three techniques for teaching spelling are given in the Phonics Handbook)
Dictation – call out the tricky words that you have been working on for the children to write.
Build Tricky Words – provide the necessary letter sounds on the table. Call out tricky words for
the children to make with the letters.
Good synthetic phonics programmes use the above five basic skills. It is important to understand the
sequence for introducing these skills and to make sure that the children are taught in a step-by-step
progression. They should not be asked to do something that has not be taught, such as read words
that have digraphs that have not been introduced. Care should be taken to keep it as simple as
possible and to ensure that the children are succeeding at every stage. It is important not to stay too
long with any activity and to keep an element of fun about it all.
Sue Lloyd – Jolly Learning 4