Letters and Sounds: Phase 3

Page Spellzone resources

 

Summary

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The purpose of this phase...
"Children entering Phase Three will know around 19 letters and be able to blend phonemes to read VC words and segment VC words to spell. While many children will be able to read and spell CVC words, they all should be able to blend and segment CVC words orally…"

"The purpose of this phase is to teach another 25 graphemes (listed below), most of them comprising two letters (e.g. oa), so the children can represent each of about 42 phonemes…"

"Children also continue to practise CVC blending and segmentation in this phase and will apply their knowledge of blending and segmenting to reading and spelling simple two-syllable words and captions…"

"It must always be remembered that phonics is the step up to word recognition. Automatic reading of all words – decodable and tricky – is the ultimate goal…"

Letters:
Set 6: j, v, w, x*
Letters Set 6 and 7 (pdf)
Set 7: y, z, zz, qu*

The Spellzone Starter Course includes recorded sounds and teaches all the basic phonic rules and includes the top 100 high frequency words.

 

Suggested timetable for Phase Three – discrete teaching

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Week 1

 

Week  2

 

Week 3

  • Practise previously learned GPCs
  • Teach the four consonant digraphs
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky words we, me, be
  • Practise reading and spelling high-frequency words
  • Practise reading two-syllable words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentences

 

Week 4

  • Practise previously learned GPCs
  • Teach four of the vowel digraphs
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky word was
  • Teach spelling the tricky words no and go
  • Practise reading and spelling high-frequency words
  • Practise reading two-syllable words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentences

 

Week 5

  • Practise previously learned GPCs
  • Teach four more vowel digraphs
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky word my
  • Practise reading and spelling high-frequency words
  • Teach spelling two-syllable words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentences

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Week 6

  • Practise previously learned GPCs
  • Teach four more vowel digraphs
  • Practise letter names
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky word you
  • Practise reading and spelling high-frequency words
  • Practise spelling two-syllable words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentences

 

Week 7

  • Practise previously learned GPCs
  • Teach four more vowel digraphs
  • Practise letter names
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky word they
  • Practise reading and spelling high-frequency words
  • Practise spelling two-syllable words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentences

 

Week 8

  • Practise all GPCs
  • Practise letter names
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky word her
  • Practise reading and spelling high-frequency words
  • Practise spelling two-syllable words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentence

 

Week 9

  • Practise all GPCs
  • Practise letter names
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky word all
  • Practise reading and spelling high-frequency words
  • Practise spelling two-syllable words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentences

 

Week 10

  • Practise all GPCs
  • Practise letter names
  • Practise blending for reading
  • Practise segmentation for spelling
  • Teach reading the tricky word are
  • Practise reading and spelling words
  • Practise spelling two-syllable high-frequency words
  • Practise reading captions and sentences
  • Practise writing captions and sentences

 

Weeks 11–12

  • More consolidation if necessary, or move on to Phase Four.

 

Teaching Sets 6 and 7 letters

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In teaching the remaining Sets 6 and 7 letters:

Words using Sets 1 – 6 GPCs:
(+j) - jam, Jill, jet, jog, Jack, Jen, jet-lag, jacket
(+v) - van, vat, vet, Vic, Ravi, Kevin, visit, velvet
(+w) - will, win, wag, web, wig, wax, cobweb, wicked
(+x) - mix, fix, box, tax, six, taxi, vixen, exit

 

Words using Sets 1–7 GPCs:
(+y) - yap, yes, yet, yell, yum-yum
(+z/zz) - zip, Zak, buzz, jazz, zigzag
(+qu) - quiz, quit, quick, quack, liquid

 

Introducing and teaching two-letter and three-letter GPCs

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Introducing two-letter GPCs
Two-part example session for teaching sh
Resources:

Procedure:
See it and say it

2. Recall that the children have already seen two letters being used in the recently learned q, which always has a u after it, and also ck and the double letters zz to ff, ll, and ss;  at the ends of some words.

3. Write some sh words on the whiteboard and others as foils.
Download as flash cards: shut, fish, shop, dash, wishes, shell, rushed, hiss, stop, such (pdf)

4. Ask six children to come to the whiteboard and one a time to find the word with a sh grapheme and underline the grapheme.

Practising grapheme recognition (for reading) and recall (for spelling)

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Flashcards
Resources:

  • Set of cards with a grapheme on one side and its mnemonic on the other (e.g. sh on one side and a picture of a finger to the mouth on the other).

 

Practising blending for reading

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What's in the box?
Resources:

  • Set of word cards (e.g. with words containing Sets 6 and 7 letters and Phase Three graphemes.

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Countdown
Resources:

  • List of Phase Three words

Select Phase Three word lists (from the resources section below) and print flash cards to use in the countdown activity.

Sentence substitution
Resources:

Matching words and pictures
Resources:

  • As 'What's in the box?' above.

Buried Treasure
Resources:

  • Set of nonsense word cards: jarm, win, jowd, yes, wug, zip, quit, vil

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Sorting
Resources:

 

Practising segmentation for spelling

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Phase Three two-letter and three-letter graphemes

Follow the same procedure as for Sets 6 and 7 words. It is important that the graphemes are units, not separate letters.

Quick write words
Resources:

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Full circle
Resources:
When the graphemes sh, ch, th and ng have been learned:

When the graphemes for the new vowel sounds have been learned:

 

Teaching and practising high-frequency (common) words

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There are 100 common words that recur frequently in much of the written material young children read and that they need when they write. Most of these are decodable, by sounding and blending, assuming the grapheme–phoneme correspondences are known, but only 26 of the high-frequency words are decodable by the end of Phase Two and a further 12 are decodable by the end of Phase Three. These are will, with, that, this, then, them, see, for, now, down, look and too.

Reading a group of these words each day, by applying grapheme-phoneme knowledge as it is acquired, will help children recognise them quickly. However, in order to read simple captions it is necessary also to know some words that have unusual or untaught GPCs, 'tricky' words, and these need to be learned (see Notes of Guidance for Practitioners and Teachers, page 15, for an explanation).

Why not set Spellzone word lists as homework tasks?

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Learning to read tricky words
he, she, we, me,  be, was, my, you, her, they, all, are (pdf)

Resources:

  • Caption containing the tricky word to be learned.

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Practising high-frequency words
The 12 decodable and 12 tricky high-frequency words need lots of practice in the manner described below so that children will be able to read them 'automatically' as soon as possible.

Resources:

  • Between five and eight high-frequency words, including decodable and tricky words, written on individual cards (pdfs).
    D
    ecodable and tricky words with sound buttons (pdfs).

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Learning to spell and practising tricky words
Children should be able to read these words before being expected to learn to spell them.
the, to, no, go, I

Procedure:
2. Say a sentence using the word.

 

Teaching reading and spelling two-syllable words

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Reading two-syllable words
Resources:

Introducing spelling two-syllable words
Resources:

Practising reading and writing captions and sentences

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Reading captions: Matching (with the teacher)
Resources:

  • Caption or sentence for one of the pictures  

Procedure:
8. As children get more practice with the high-frequency words, it should not be necessary to continue sound-talking them.

Reading captions: Matching (independent of the teacher)
Resources:
Captions or sentences for one of the pictures 

Drawing
Resources:

  • Two captions or sentences

Why not create your own word lists with sentences?

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'I can...' books
Resources:

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Yes/no questions
Resources:

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Demonstration writing
Resources:

Pictures of subjects that have VC, CV and CVC names (pdf)

 

Assessment

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By the end of Phase Three children should:

 

Bank of suggested words, captions and sentences for use in Phase Three

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The words in this section are made up from the letters taught for use in blending for reading and segmentation for spelling. These lists are not for working through slavishly but to be selected from as needed for an activity. (Words in italics are from the list of 100 high frequency words).

Words and sentences using sets – letters

Words using sets 1 – 6 GPCs

(+j) - jam, Jill, jet, jog, Jack, Jen, jet-lag, jacket
(+v) - van, vat, vet, Vic, Ravi, Kevin, visit, velvet
(+w) - will, win, wag, web, wig, wax, cobweb, wicked
(+x) - mix, fix, box, tax, six, taxi, vixen, exit

 

Words using sets 1 – 7 GPCs

(+y) - yap, yes, yet, yell, yum-yum
(+z/zz) - zip, Zak, buzz, jazz, zigzag
(+qu) - quiz, quit, quick, quack, liquid

Yes/no questions with words containing sets 1–6 GPCs
Yes/no questions with words containing sets 1–7 GPCs

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Sentences using words containing sets – GPCs and he, we and she

Sentences are offered here to give children practice in reading and understanding short texts which are fully decodable.

Words and sentences using Phase Three graphemes

Words using the four consonant digraphs
Each of these words contains the target grapheme but no other Phase Three graphemes. This means that the Phase Three graphemes can be taught in any order.

ch - chop, chin, chug, check, such, chip, chill, much, rich, chicken
sh - ship, shop, shed, shell, fish, shock, cash, bash, hush, rush
th - them, then, that, this, with, moth, thin, thick, path (north), bath (north)
ng - ring, rang, hang, song, wing, rung, king, long, sing, ping-pong

Sentences with Set 1–7 letters plus the four consonant digraphs and some tricky words

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Words using the Phase Three vowel graphemes

ee - see, feel, weep, feet, jeep, seem, meet, week, deep, keep
igh - high, sigh, light, might, night, right, sight, fight, tight, tonight
oa - coat, load, goat, loaf, road, soap, oak, toad, foal, boatman
oo - too, zoo, boot, hoof, zoom, cool, food, root, moon, rooftop, look, foot, cook, good, book, took, wood, wool, hook, hood
ar - bar, car, bark, card, cart, hard, jar, park, market, farmyard
or - for, fork, cord, cork, sort, born, worn, fort, torn
ur - fur, burn, urn, burp, curl, hurt, surf, turn, turnip, curds
ow - now, down, owl, cow, how, bow, pow!, row, town, towel
oi - oil, boil, coin, coil, join, soil, toil, quoit, poison, tinfoil 
ear - ear, dear, fear, hear, gear, near, tear, year, rear, beard
air - air, fair , hair, lair, pair, cairn
ure - sure, lure, assure, insure, pure, cure, secure, manure, mature
er - hammer, letter, rocker, ladder, supper, dinner, boxer, better, summer, banner

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Words with a combination of two Phase Three graphemes

cheep, tooth, chair, sharp, torch, looking, sheet, harsh, waiter, poach, orchard, powder, thing, short, arch, shoal, north, lightning, thorn, church
and
chain, shook, farmer, porch, teeth, singer, faith, shark, shorter, thicker, coach, shear, sheep, march, longer

Captions
Captions (pdf)
Sentences

Sentences for the end of Phase Three

On the farm
In town
In a wigwam
At the river
In the woods

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Sentences for 'Sentence substitution'
Yes/no questions suitable for the end of Phase Three

Search word lists


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