Phase 2 Phonics

We are excited to share that we are now starting Phase 2 Phonics!

This is an important and exciting stage in your child's reading and writing journey. During Phase 2, children begin learning:

• Letter names
• Letter sounds
• Actions linked to each sound
• How to form and write letters

Each week, your child will bring home their phonics book containing the new sounds we have learned in class. We encourage you to spend a few minutes looking through it together.

When sharing the phonics book, please ask your child to:

• Tell you the letter name
• Say the letter sound
• Show you the action

In the book, there is an empty page with the week's sounds stuck in. This page can be used for practising letter formation at home. Please only use this page for writing practice.

Reading at Home

Alongside their phonics book, your child will also bring home:

• A phonics reading book
• A story book to share together

Please enjoy both books with your child. As you read, encourage them to look for any sounds they already know in the words and pictures. Building confidence with familiar sounds is a wonderful way to support early reading skills.

Remember, the most important thing is to make reading enjoyable. Sharing books together every day helps children develop a lifelong love of reading.

Top Tip: Use Pure Sounds

When helping your child with phonics, it is important to use pure sounds.

For example:

✅ "mmmm" not "muh"
✅ "ssss" not "suh"
✅ "tttt" not "tuh"

Using pure sounds helps children blend sounds together more easily when they begin reading words.

Phonics Glossary

Grapheme
A grapheme is the letter or letters that represent a sound. For example, the grapheme s represents the sound /s/.

Phoneme
A phoneme is the sound we hear in a word. For example, the word sat has three phonemes: /s/ /a/ /t/.

Digraph
A digraph is two letters that work together to make one sound, such as sh, ch or ai.

Tricky Words
These are words that cannot always be sounded out easily using phonics knowledge. Examples include I, the, no, go and to. Children learn to recognise these words by sight.

CVC Words
CVC stands for Consonant-Vowel-Consonant. These are simple words such as cat, dog, sit, hat and pin.

How You Can Help at Home

A few minutes each day spent looking at sounds, practising letter formation, talking about letters and sharing books can make a huge difference to your child's confidence and progress.

Thank you for your continued support. We are looking forward to seeing the children's excitement and success as they begin this important stage of learning!

The Reception Team

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