At our school, we use Victoria’s Phonics Plus program to support children to become confident, accurate and fluent readers and spellers.

Phonics Plus is part of the Victorian Department of Education’s approach to teaching reading in the early years of school. It uses a systematic synthetic phonics approach, which means children are explicitly taught the relationships between sounds and letters and then learn how to blend these sounds together to read words and segment words to spell them.

What does Phonics Plus look like in the classroom?

Phonics Plus provides a clear, structured sequence for teaching reading and spelling. Children are explicitly taught:

• Phonics – the sounds represented by letters and groups of letters
• Phonemic awareness – hearing and working with the individual sounds in spoken words
• Blending – putting sounds together to read a word
• Segmenting – breaking words into sounds to support spelling
• Reading fluency – developing accuracy, pace and expression when reading
• Handwriting – learning to form letters accurately and automatically
• High-frequency words and spelling patterns
• Morphology – understanding meaningful parts of words, such as prefixes, suffixes and base words
• Dictation – applying phonics and spelling knowledge through writing.

Why is phonics important?

Learning phonics gives children the tools they need to work out unfamiliar words rather than having to memorise every word they encounter. As children develop their knowledge of sounds and letters, they become increasingly able to decode words when reading and encode words when spelling.

Phonics is an important part of learning to read, but it is not the whole reading program. Children also need rich opportunities to develop vocabulary, oral language, reading fluency and comprehension, as well as a love of books and reading.

How can I help my child at home?

You don't need to be a reading expert to support your child's reading development.

You can help by:

• reading with your child every day
• encouraging your child to sound out unfamiliar words using the sounds they have learned
• asking your child to tell you about what they have read
• talking about new and interesting words
• encouraging your child to read aloud
• celebrating their effort and progress
• continuing to share and enjoy books together.

If your child brings home a decodable book, encourage them to use the phonics knowledge they have been learning at school to read the words. It is perfectly fine to read the book more than once – repeated reading helps build accuracy, confidence and fluency.

What if my child speaks another language at home?

Your home language is an important part of your child's identity and learning. Speaking, reading and sharing stories in your home language helps build language and literacy skills.

Learning phonics at school supports children to read and write in Standard Australian English, while their home language or dialect remains valuable and important.

Find out more

The Victorian Department of Education has developed some helpful resources for families:

• Phonics: A guide for parents and carers – an easy-to-understand guide explaining phonics, systematic synthetic phonics and ways families can support reading at home.
• Victorian teaching and learning information for parents and carers – information about Victoria's approach to reading, phonics and other aspects of teaching and learning.
• Understanding phonics – a guide for parents, carers and families – practical information and ideas for supporting your child's phonics learning at home, in adition to this advice.
• Victorian Year 1 Phonics Check – information about the assessment used to help teachers understand children's phonics knowledge and identify where additional support may be needed.

If you have questions about how your child is learning to read or would like some ideas for supporting them at home, please speak with your child's teacher.