The Magic and Mystery of Learning to Read:

A practical approach to implementing phonics in the classroom

Jo-Anne Dooner

he media generation our children, and

their children, are growing up with the
rapid increase in the use of digital media
broadcast, social, online media and mobile
communication. It has changed the way young
people gather and process information; and, we are
only now beginning to change the way we teach
reading in the classroom.
This article argues that electronic aids can support
the development of phonics knowledge as part of
a balanced reading program. It starts by taking
a look at the synthetic phonics approach being
used in some schools and then talks about how to
compliment phonics teaching with interactive and
fun technology.

have been able to re-wire in such a way that allows

our brain to learn to read. While it is true that many
children do learn to read and spell; the evidence is
now clear, that there is a faster, more effective and
inclusive way of doing this that may help avoid
the unnecessary underperformance and failure of
many of our children. This approach is systematic
synthetic phonics.
Hence, traditional pencil and paper strategies for
teaching reading may need to be tweaked in order to
get the best results from all students, but at the same
time, still respect the difficulties inherent in learning
to read in a language such as English.

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Many teachers have been using phonics in the

classroom for decades. However, phonics is only one
piece in the reading puzzle. Before powering up the
motherboard, any good curriculum to teach reading
needs to include five elements that work in harmony
to create a well rounded and balanced approach to
teaching reading. These are:
1. Phonemic Awareness
2. Phonic Knowledge
3. Vocabulary Knowledge
4. Reading Fluency
5. Reading Comprehension (NRP, 2011).

1 & 2. Phonics and Phonemic Awareness

PR IMAR Y

Phonemic awareness is the ability to hear, focus

on, and manipulate phonemes (sounds) in spoken
words. It has been found that having good phonemic
awareness is the best indicator of future success in
learning to read. Online games and websites that
recite nursery rhymes are a great way to reinforce
these necessary skills.
Synthetic phonics starts from the basis that
there are 44 sounds used in the English language
and that these are all taught in an explicit fashion.
Synthetic phonics teaching shows children how each
of the 44 phonemes can be represented by letters
or combinations of letters (graphemes). It allows
children to master the phonic code from the very
simple to the more complex in a systematic way.
This step by step method of teaching, with each
stage building on and reinforcing the previous, is

PRACTI CA LL Y

One thing is obvious when it comes to teaching

reading traditional approaches severely
underestimate just how, at first glance, complicated
the English language is, both to read and to
spell. Most of us, with the exception of those who
struggled, have largely forgotten the bafflement
when our teacher told us one rule one day, but
contradicted the rule the next.
As the Australian Curriculum states, English
learning for early reading and writing must include,
phonological knowledge and phonemic awareness,
sound letter correspondences, and using syntactic
and semantic cues to make meaning, (ACARA,
2010). However, in its present form, the curriculum
document so far doesnt explain how to implement
this practically in the classroom or for the media
generation.
The good news is we do not need to go back
to school ourselves in order to learn how to teach
reading in this electronic age. Implementing modern
learning methods, such as with an online platform
need not mean throwing the baby out with the bath
water by buying an iPad2! Use the same content, the
same fun games, but let the children learn using a
different medium.
Wolf (2008) explains that our brains are
programmed to learn spoken language, but are not
hardwired to learn to read. Unlike vision or speech,
we have no genetic program for reading. We are not
born with a reading gene; but our neural pathways

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Five of Reading

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NUMBE R 1

FE BRUARY

2012

supportive of children learning the reading process.

In Australia we have a small group of synthetic
phonics programs available in the classroom. The
sequence of the first eight sounds (s m c t g p a o) is
taught together over six to eight weeks. Putting these
sounds together is called blending or synthesising
and produces over 40 words; not bad for a childs
first few weeks at school! You can imagine the
confidence that comes from this level of progress.
The first thirty sounds can be taught in a period of
around twenty weeks, in some cases even faster.
Synthetic phonics aims for zero reading failure so
that from day one, lesson one, struggling children
are identified for small amounts of attention. The
aim is that no one in the class should be left behind
before the class moves on to the next unit. We
want the first years of teaching to be as effective as
possible rather than waiting for literacy support in
years to come.

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Once a child can hear phonemes in a word, he

or she needs to learn that we can assign a letter to
represent each phoneme. For example to read the
word CAT, the child has to recognise that the C
represents the phoneme /c/ the A, /a/ and the T,
/t/; then blend or glue each of these together to read
the word CAT. Similarly to spell the word, CAT,
the child needs the skills to break the word CAT
into each of the three phonemes and then choose
a letter to represent each one, thereby spelling the
CAT. A particular emphasis from some phonics
programs has been to insist on the target of fluency,
or automaticity being developed at each level with
a fast read of the target words. So we are looking
for cat not c-a-t. This frees up working memory
capacity, making the next stage easier to learn and
also assists in improving comprehension. The easier
the decoding process for the child, the more working
memory is left for comprehension. Online phonics
programs encourage children to play the same
games over and over again. It is this repetition that
allows children to recognise phonemes quickly and
automatically which leads to fluency and ultimately
better comprehension.

Synthetic phonics theory recognises the

limitations of an over reliance on visual memory
approaches and therefore, demands just to
remember, are reduced to the minimum. Children
learn by sight only a small number of words
essential for their writing but, at their stage of
reading development, cannot yet be decoded
(irregular, high frequency words). The first half
dozen are I, was, are, the, to, she. Such an approach
clearly delineates the decodable from the nondecodable (in the early stages), thus helping the child
to adopt a blending and segmenting approach as
their default strategy.

3. Vocabulary Knowledge
Vocabulary researchers, Hart and Risley (1995) say
that our children are living today in a state of word
poverty. They argue that in todays society children
are more likely to have mastered the internet before
they are required to start kindergarten. And further,
that they can obtain the answer to their questions
in seconds through Google, sending a text or IMing.
Communication takes so many non-vocal forms that
we can forget to simply talk! Parents and teachers
can enrich a childs vocabulary simply by reading to
them.
Compounding the situation is the convoluted
spellings of the English language. This, in tandem
with limited vocabulary means more and more
children and adults underperform in writing as they
rely on an impoverished vocabulary (because they
cannot spell the words they would like to use) and
write the bare minimum. Having a large and useful
vocabulary is essential for reading and writing.
Without a sound vocabulary, meaning is easily lost.

4. Reading Fluency
Reading fluency is only one of the several critical
factors necessary for good reading comprehension.
When children read with speed, accuracy and
expression, they are more likely to comprehend
and remember the content, than if they read
with difficulty. Being a fluent reader can leave a
child with enough working memory to attend to
comprehension.

5. Comprehension
Reading comprehension is the ability to get the
meaning and the messages from text. Harvey and
Goudvis (2000) explain that comprehension can be
thought of as an internal dialogue between reader
and author. Children use their background and
vocabulary knowledge to create sensory images
and then to understand what is read. It is these
sensory or visual images that make reading so much
fun! Very good comprehension allows a child to
take meaning from the text and transform it into

something different or more personal. Without

good comprehension, all learning, in all subjects, is
affected.

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There is a growing number of schools whose goal
is zero reading failure. They have had to challenge
accepted ways of teaching and have adopted
synthetic phonics, using traditional and/or online
methods enthusiastically as their approach to the
early teaching of reading and spelling.
In late 2009, Blaxcell Street Public School, Sydney
implemented synthetic phonics across the whole
school. In an area where 98 percent of children
have a language background other than English,
teaching reading and spelling was a huge challenge
with 52 per cent of pupils facing reading difficulties.
With just two days of literacy training on the
theory of synthetic phonics and the practicalities
of its implementation, the staff initiated synthetic
phonics lessons across the school for just half an
hour per day. In just a few terms, the previous
figure of 52 per cent was reduced to 12 per cent of
children considered to have reading difficulties.
Blaxcell Street Public School also committed to teach
an explicit, systematic comprehension program,
address vocabulary knowledge and reading fluency.
Classroom teachers read daily to their classes
and endeavoured to increase vocabulary through
rich talking and listening activities. The Principal
commented,
The parents are delighted at the improvement in
our reading results. The children are proud of their
achievements too! The teachers are motivated and
highly engaged in the delivery of a quality teaching
and learning program that supports all children in
achieving success.

Using the electronic whiteboard, Christine began

working with small groups of students for half an

The good news is that we can all give students

a positive learning experience when it comes to
literacy in a media savvy way. One that is enjoyable
whilst being educational at the same time, for
teacher and student. There are a myriad of tools and
resources available to access games, interactive
tools and full lesson plans. We should no longer feel
shackled to hours of watching children complete
worksheet after worksheet, getting nowhere fast!
Synthetic phonics online programs can be quick to
pick up and implement; multi-sensory, entertaining
and learning oriented in an environment that
meshes with their daily lives.
As a literacy trainer, I look forward to seeing more
electronic teaching aids available to teachers and
schools which will help our young Australians learn
to read and spell.
References
ACARA (2010). Australian Curriculum Information Sheet
English. Australian Curriculum Assessment and
Reporting Authority, Australia. Accessed November 2011
at http://www.acara.edu.au/verve/_resources/English.
pdf
Hart, B. & Risley, T. (1995). Meaningful Differences in the
Everyday Experiences of Young American Children, Paul H.
Brookes Publishing Co, USA.
Harvey, S. & Goudvis, A. (2000). Strategies That Work.
Stenhouse Publishers, UK.
National Reading Panel (2011). National Reading Panel
(NRP) website Last accessed December 2011 at http://
www.nationalreadingpanel.org, USA
Wolf, M. (2008). Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science
of the Reading Brain HarperCollins, NY, USA.

Jo-Anne Dooner is a literacy trainer and the author of Get

Reading Rights synthetic phonics program.
jdooner@getreadingright.com.au or via www.getreadingright.
com.au

PR IMAR Y

Children today are surrounded by electronic devices,

it is how this generation learns and lives. In October
we implemented Phonics Hero as part of our reading
group curriculum for Year 1 students and instantly
saw results.

Looking ahead

PRACTI CA LL Y

In another example, Prairievale Public School in

Bossley Park, NSW took synthetic phonics teaching
into the electronic age by introducing additional
teaching tools in the form of an online synthetic
phonics platform. The platform, Phonics Hero is
being used by Kindergarten and Year 1 students
and consists of 228 research-based lessons for early
readers. These lessons aim to teach sounds, reading,
spelling, camera word (or sight word) reading and
spelling, as well as sentence reading. They are all
based on the synthetic phonics approach. Classroom
teacher, Christine Alderson noted,

hour a week. By the first week, some students were

playing the interactive games and trying to beat
Christine in saving the superhero characters on the
platform.

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