The debate over the effectiveness of phonics in teaching children to read has rumbled on for decades. But three recent developments have pushed it to the forefront once more: an Ofsted report warning of 'a tail-end of underachievement' in reading, a robust examination of the issue before the Commons education and skills committee, and a study claiming that pupils taught 'synthetic phonics' are more than three years ahead of their peers in their reading age.
Advocates of the synthetic phonics approach claim that the research, conducted by psychologists from the universities of Hull and St Andrews, demonstrates that it is particularly effective among boys and the 20 per cent who find reading hardest. They are demanding further changes to the national literacy strategy (NLS) to fully incorporate the use of synthetic phonics.
Those with misgivings about relying on phonics at too early an age believe it is too formal, old-fashioned - at odds, therefore, with the creative thrust of the Foundation Stage curriculum - and a cure-all wheeled out when literacy statistics look grim.
Synthetic phonics teaches children to read all the words they encounter by producing sounds for the letters and then blending these sounds to form words. Supporters of this method argue that once a child is able to work out the words and decode them, they can begin to understand their meaning.
It is now being used in 300 schools in England and Scotland.
The Clackmannanshire study, which was backed by the Scottish Executive, involved 300 Primary 1 children spending 20 minutes a day learning the technique. In their last year at primary school, they were found to be more than three years ahead in reading and nearly two years ahead in spelling beyond what they would be expected to achieve at that age.
By the end of the second year at school, girls were better readers if they had done synthetic phonics early rather than later. Both boys and girls were better spellers if they had done synthetic phonics early.
Rhona Johnston, professor of psychology at the University of Hull, who undertook the seven-year study with Dr Joyce Watson of St Andrews University, says children were initially only taught a few sounds, such as 'a', 't' and 'p'. The process of blending sounds was reinforced by urging them to push magnetic letters together.
Professor Johnston argues that synthetic phonics helped to raise the self-esteem, particularly of boys and less able readers, and was far more effective in tackling the 'tail-end of underachievement' in reading than the Government's range of 12- and 15-week 'catch-up' programmes.
'Instead of the results trailing away, which quite often happens in these intervention studies, in fact the effects have got much larger. When we tested last summer we found the children reading 42 months ahead of chronological age, and that's up from seven months in their first year at school,' she adds.
Complementary methods
Many synthetic phonics programmes concentrate on teaching children 43 letter sounds and combinations over a 16-week period before introducing them to books. In contrast, the NLS's 'searchlights' model has beginners reading books from the start and then identifying words by some blending but largely relying on a 'multi-cueing system' using context, sight-word recognition, grammar and pictures.
A DfES spokesman says these complementary reading strategies are not at odds with synthetic phonics, which he claims is now 'the principal method of instruction' within the strategy.
The DfES held a seminar in 2003 which examined research and practical experiences of phonics teaching and heard a presentation from Professor Johnston on an earlier phase of the Clackmannanshire study. The seminar, which was chaired by Professor Greg Brooks of Sheffield University, found that 'a major redirection of the phonics element of the National Literacy Strategy is neither necessary or appropriate' but concluded that 'a number of revisions and some focused research is needed'.
The result was a paper clarifying the interpretation and application of the NLS, entitled Teaching Phonics in the National Literacy Strategy, and a supplement to the main teaching materials of the NLS, Playing with Sounds, 'to make its support for primary schools and early years settings a more detailed and fully resourced programme', says the spokesman.
However, supporters of synthetic phonics question the DfES's claim that their method is the predominant one being used in the NLS following comments to the Commons education and skills committee by director of the NLS Kevan Collins in December.
In the latest issue of the Reading Reform Foundation newsletter, they say that while Dr Collins placed a priority on developing phonic knowledge, he 'also implied that all four searchlight strategies should be used from the start for word identification'.
Far enough?
Sue Palmer, a literacy specialist and author of Foundations of Literacy, says that while she is critical of the NLS, she believes Playing With Sounds is 'very sympathetic to synthetic phonics' and that the Government has gone far enough in accommodating this outlook.
However, Professor Johnston insists that synthetic phonics cannot simply be tacked on to the multi-cueing strategy outlined in the NLS. She says, 'These approaches actually conflict. What should a child do when it comes across a word it doesn't know? Should it be trying to sound and blend it? Should it be guessing from context? Should it be looking at pictures for clues?' Giving children a variety of strategies to choose from, she says, is not beneficial to the child if they represent wrong approaches.
Sue Lloyd, author of Jolly Phonics and an advocate of synthetic phonics, says that while the NLS incorporates elements of the blending approach, it is 'nowhere near enough' and its watered-down version means that children take far longer to decode words. She adds, 'They don't teach many of the long vowels until the end of Year One, two years after children have started at school, and yet they ask them to read books that have these sounds in them.' She says that the Jolly Phonics programme is increasingly used in schools, but claims that it is often misused 'to support the national literacy strategy rather than as an alternative to it'.
Children are being asked to read books without having the necessary skills and this leads to demoralisation and boredom among some pupils, according to Ruth Miskin, creator of Read Write Inc., who spreads the use of synthetic phonics to schools throughout the UK. She rejects claims that phonics is dull - 'It can be fun, and children enjoy being successful.'
She says it is essential 'to get children's ability to decode well ahead of their comprehension. If you don't help them crack the code, how can they get into harder books?' Without being properly equipped, children who cannot read might spend frustrating hours trying to follow discussions about the plot, characterisation and settings of a book.
Formal approach
Sue Wood, a reception class teacher at Parkstone Primary school in Hull, has worked closely with Hull university in applying synthetic phonics to assist her pupils' reading. 'A Year One teacher told me the children are much further on with their reading by the time they get into her class,'
she says.
Children responded well to the 16-week intensive course in phonics, starting with alphabet chanting and magnetic letters to learn shapes.
However, she admits, 'I did find it quite restricting, very formal, and the way it is taught really goes against everything we are supposed to do in the play-based curriculum of the Foundation Stage. We like the ideas underlying it, but I don't stick to it too formally now and spread the work out over a year.'
Marion Whitehead, a literacy expert, remains sceptical of the Clackmannanshire findings because 'the research does not isolate the many complex factors that enable children to become readers and to understand phonics' and 'it does not tell us what the experiences of the children were before they were assessed'.
She says it is not surprising that by the age of six or seven children will begin to understand how phonics may be useful in grasping a range of different words and that it represents another 'tool in their armoury' as they learn to read. But she points out that the process of blending sounds would not help with words such as 'thought' or 'enough'.
In its highly critical report on reading standards, Ofsted says that the teaching of phonics in successful schools was 'rigorous and well focused on those pupils who needed it most'. However, toeing the DfES line, it adds that phonics were successfully taught 'alongside a broader range of reading strategies which encouraged pupils to read for meaning and understanding as well as accuracy'.
The great phonics debate is set to run and run. The DfES has ensured this by announcing that it has 'commissioned a further review of all the relevant phonics research'.