Letters and Sounds 1

Letters and Sounds: Phase Three
Practising blending for reading
What’s in the box?
Resources
Letters and Sounds: Principles and Practice of High Quality Phonics
Primary National Strategy
Blending for reading
■ Set of word cards (e.g. with words containing sets 6 and 7 letters and Phase
Three graphemes: see page 100–102 for suggestions)
■ Set of objects or pictures corresponding to the word cards, hidden in a box
■ Soft toy (optional) chop light
• • • •
Procedure
1. Display a word card.
2. Go through the grapheme recognition and blending process, placing a sound
button below each grapheme, as illustrated. Draw attention to the long sound
buttons under the two-letter and three-letter graphemes.
3. Ask the toy or a child to find the corresponding object or picture in the box.
Variation 1 (to additionally develop vocabulary)
1. Attach some pictures to the whiteboard using reusable sticky pads or magnets
or display some objects.
2. Display a word card.
3. Go through the grapheme recognition and blending process as above.
4. Ask a child to place the word card next to the corresponding picture or object.
Variation 2 (when children are confident blenders)
1. Children sit in two lines opposite one another.
2. Give the children in one line an object or picture and the children in the other line
a word card.
3. Ask the children with word cards to read their words and ask the children with
objects or pictures to ‘sound-talk’ the name of their object or picture to the child
sitting next to them.
4. Ask the children to hold up their words and objects or pictures so the children
sitting in the line opposite can see them.
00281-2007BKT-EN
© Crown copyright 2007