there should be some body within this nation that will use each programme uncontaminated, test and report to the nation. The NFER should do this but they said they could, would only do research that is "funded". Well, government should fund it. But government still claims "Letters and Sounds " is "systematic" synthetic phonics. W can argue till we are blue in the face. By now only objective research and data will do any of us any good.
In my previous posts I have made all the points that matter.
There is nobody in government that will sit down with me and really address their minds to what I am saying! Today's professionals, who have presided over decades of decline, still rule the roost.

Getting programmes used 'uncontaminated' is extremely difficult. Even in their well-run Clackmannanshire study, Johnston and Watson couldn't secure complete freedom from contamination - in order to get teachers to co-operate, they had to allow the introduction of non-phonic reading books after 6 weeks, which was earlier than they wanted.

I'm sure that there are very few schools where Letters and Sounds is used in an uncontaminated form, but even where it's contaminated (e.g. by the use of reading books which encourage guessing from pictures) it seems to be making a difference. I have test results from a Reception class in one such school: a few weeks before the end of the school year, the children's word-reading ability was on average about a year above chronological age - their average reading quotient was 119 calculated your way, Mona. OK, things could be even better if there were no contamination, and possibly much better still if a programme other than L and S were being used, but we haven't yet found a way of getting the sort of ideal that we want, and in the meantime I think we should welcome the moves that there have been in the right direction.

Jenny C.

I did welcome teh approval of phonics given by Rose 2006, but "Letters and Sounds" is no improement on Jolly Phonics.
We need someone to be interested, curious to see if there is a small or even BIG difference in results after teaching programmes designed via ENcoding sounds>;letters (we have results) or programmes designd via DEcoding (reading)DEcoding letters>sounds (results from the American Spalding, Irina Tyk's Butterfly and my Step.) I think Irina's results (available) surpass any others at present being used.
Why are the educrats NOT INTERESTED?

Re. Irina Tyk's programme - we established some time ago that she herself regards it as sounds-to-letters. One problem is that different people mean different things by sounds-to-letters and letters-to-sounds. Unless we can agree what we mean we'll keep going round in circles. If the educrats don't seem interested, it may be because they don't see a clear difference.

As far as I'm concerned, results are what count. I know Irina's results because I have done the testing at her school for the past two years at her request - this has been a great pleasure and privilege. Yes, her results are excellent, but one has to bear in mind that her classes are small and the average level of parental support is greater than it would be in many state schools.

Jenny C.

I ahve now looked again at Irina Tyk's Butterfly and have to agree that it is sounds>letters.
So programmes to my way of thinking are my Step by Step, "Alpha to Omega" (which is a suprb reference book for teachers rather thana simple manual), and Spalding "The Writing Road to Reading" in America.

We still need to know which works best, from impartial research. It may make very little difference, or it may amke a BIG difference, especially as to whether dyslexics develop reading problems, or not.

You yourself, Mona, regard the difference between letters-to-sounds and sounds-to-letters as one which needs careful investigation, and yet you go from thinking that Irina Tyk's Butterfly programme is letters-to-sounds to agreeing that it's sounds-to-letters. Can you see that this may be confusing for people, including any politicians whom you are trying to persuade about the importance of this issue? Is the difference really so clear-cut if you yourself put a particular programme first in one category and then in the other?

Another thing: you say that Letters and Sounds is 'no improvement on Jolly Phonics', which implies that your opinion of JP isn't great. But whatever its shortcomings in your eyes, would you accept that JP has probably done more than any other programme to raise the profile of simple, sensible, child-friendly phonics?

Jenny C.

Yes indeed. Jolly Phonics has done tremendous service in keeping phonics alive.
My point is that the RRF shouldnow be looking to see what is best.

The RRF is not really in a position to do objective research on this. As things stand, different RRFers regard different programmes as 'best' but are happy for the most part to stress common ground rather than differences - i.e. to pull together. I've said all along that I think this is the right approach for now - let's get generic phonics firmly established before we start investigating whether particular variations produce markedly different results.

Jenny C.