[SENco-forum] a definition of synthetic phonics

I thought the basic premise was that synthetic phonics introduces the sounds
(phoneme)in complete isolation to its written representation (grapheme)
initially. No more and no less.

It is like parents teaching a child to speak - cat ccc cat . 'What starts
with ccc?'  Many children learn that nouns have an initial sound before they
get to school via this, and the logographic and legendary  M=McDonalds !

I use to play'I hear with my little ear something beginning with 'c' with my
children and so they knew their letter sounds before they went to school.
Harder was attaching them to the grapheme and harder still for one (later
Statemented with dyslexia) was learning to blend as Philip mentioned. To
overcome this we had 'I can hear with my little ear something beginning with
'bl' etc., and started a picture dictionary that had pages marked  a - b -
bl-br- c -ch - d  dr  etc.,

The difficulty comes for teachers using synthetic phonics in learning to
make clean sounds in isolation that do not include 'schwa' at the end as can
be seen if you try to sound out the word cat crisply i.e.  c-a-t not
c-a-tter
So if synthetic phonic schemes come with sound tapes for teachers then
great.

The action approach a-a-a-ant is engaging when helping the child to learn
the sound or isolate the initial sound and a good kinaesthetic reminder, but
I find some of the action in Jolly Phonics very confusing.  I want to
y-yoyo, not y-yogurt - how is the child supposed to remember what they are
eating?

Synthetic phonic schemes are changing and growing - initially some did not
include initial blends and later on there seems to be the teaching of
different graphemes to phonemes.   No wonder everyone is confused. I do not
regard this part  A= ai/ay as synthetic phonics per se, but general teaching
and learning and same as it ever was. All that has happened is that it has
been written down to be used in a progressive format similar to that given
for those with dyslexia and used as a checklist so that nothing is
overlooked.

For me Analytical phonics starts with a written word - cat - and breaks it
down as c-a-t   or onset & rime  c-at and the method I use for children with
SpLD when learning has not taken place, or broken down somewhere.  It is a
way to find pattern and a sense of order when nothing seems to make sense.
It gives a basic grasp of literacy to some when everyone else seems to have
just magically absorbed the rules.

Both have a very valid place in learning.  Some children extrapolate the
individual sounds in words and can attach them to the individual or multiple
graphemes and learn to read and spell from only seeing whole words (although
there is no way of knowing what tuition they had at home with individual
sounds!)and can happily juggle with them, breaking them down and building
them up.

Others cannot do this, or having come from using a different first language,
need specific teaching on letter sounds and where they occur within a work
to start the process of reading/spelling and is good in Reception so that
everyone starts off singing from the same hymn sheet. After this there is
room for individual preference -most children do best with a mixture of both
phonic and whole word work while a few do best with one or the other.
Either way it should never be Synthetic v. Analytical or phonic v. whole
word.

Sharon

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