At Darton Primary School, we want every child to develop the skills, confidence and love of reading they need to succeed. Through our Read Write Inc. (RWI) phonics programme, children learn to read step by step, building their skills as they progress from recognising sounds to reading stories independently.
Read Write Inc. is a structured phonics programme that teaches children the relationship between letters and sounds. Children learn to recognise sounds, blend them together to read words, and apply their skills when reading books matched to their developing knowledge. They also practise writing sounds and words, develop their comprehension and build reading fluency.
When pupils first enter in Reception, they robustly follow the Read, Write, Inc. systematic synthetic phonics (SSP) scheme. This is followed until Year 2 and is taught progressively and with fidelity. Children, who are within Reception and KS1, are taught each day in small, teacher-led groups to learn sounds and reading skills according to their ability which is assessed each half term.
To ensure pupils retain their knowledge of phonemes and graphemes, they spend 45 minutes daily on this Systematic Synthetic Phonics programme, as well as revisiting sounds through an additional quick-fire ‘Speed Sounds’ session daily. Pupils who are not keeping up with their peers undertake daily Fast Track Tutoring intervention support and where pupils have not yet mastered the English alphabetic code in Key Stage 2 they access the Fresh Start Programme to ensure they catch up quickly.
The Reading Leader oversees the teaching of the scheme by carrying out side-by-side coaching throughout the week. Teachers attend weekly training to ensure that their skills are constantly being developed. Where needed, children will be given focused 1-2-1 (fast track tutoring) or small group support to help develop their knowledge of the sounds or word blending.
Our teaching is carefully sequenced, with regular opportunities to practise and revisit learning. Children are supported to make progress from their individual starting points.
Click Fred Frog to find a video about the RWI Program.
1. Speed Sounds 
Children learn the sounds that letters or groups of letters represent. They practise saying these sounds clearly and recognising them quickly.
Click on Fred to find guidance on how to say the individual sounds.
2. Fred Talk and Blending
Children use Fred Talk to say the sounds in a word before blending them together. For example, c–a–t becomes cat. Fred is our friendly frog who helps children practise reading words.
Click on Fred to find out more about blending.
3. Rea
d, Reread and Understand
Children practise reading carefully matched books more than once to develop accuracy, fluency and expression. They also talk about characters, events, vocabulary and what they have understood.
Click on Fred to find out more about listening to your child read.
You don’t need to be a phonics expert to make a huge difference! Little and often is a great approach. Here are our top tips for supporting your child.
darton_reading_banner_A4_landscape