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About Phonica |
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Frequently Asked Questions
Phonica - Frequently Asked Questions.
What is Phonica?
Phonica is a teaching system for reading, based on best practice for teaching literacy. It's just like one to one tutoring from the best trained teacher and takes a student back to the absolute basics to make sure he or she has a solid foundation. Then through a series of carefully structured lessons it:
1. Builds up reading fluency,
2. Teaches the child how to understand what's being read ie comprehension
3. How to spell accurately and quickly
4. Express themselves in writing.
Not only that, it's the only such system of its kind in the world where you can add your own material and even your child's homework so it fits exactly with what's going on at school.
Why would you choose Phonica over, say one to one tutoring?
Finding the right tutor for your child is tough and knowing that the tutor is properly trained in reading instruction is also hard. Then when you've found a good tutor, they're usually busy, so the times may not be convenient. It's also rare to find a family that can afford more than once-a-week tuition when the research indicates that daily tuition yields the best results.
What reading age is Phonica suitable for?
Phonica Elementary is ideal for primary school students or students who may wish to go back to the basics. Phonica also provides the best possible foundations for the beginning reader. Phonica Advanced then takes the student further as their skills and confidence improve.
Phonica can teach reading from the beginning and can teach literacy to an older child who may be struggling a little.
The fact that the program takes the child back to basics and that students go at their own pace means that the starting reading level is not important, however starting from the beginning is recommended.
What evidence have you got that Phonica works?
Phonica is based on the best international research on how to teach reading effectively. It has been developed by experienced educational professionals. In addition, we have completed an independent trial confirming advances in key skills and advances in reading age. Successfully trialed.
Does it teach phonics?
As the name Phonica implies, phonics is at the heart of the system - but it goes much further than that, teaching:
- reading
- spelling
- sight word recognition
- left to right reinforcement
- comprehension
- fluency
- basic grammar and other key skills.
What is Phonics?
Phonics is the understanding of letter / sound relationships between phonemes (sounds of spoken language) and graphemes (the letters and spellings that represent those sounds). In written language this is often referred to as the alphabetic principle or more commonly known as phonics.
What computer do I need?
- The minimum Operating System requirements for both Phonica and An English Story is windows 98 SE.
- The minimum system requirements for Phonica: a 500MHz processor, 256Mb Ram, 400Mb hard disc space per Phonica program (additional space is required for custom material entered), sound card and speakers. A microphone is required to add verbal custom content to Phonca.
- The minimum system requirements for An English Story: a 500MHz processor, 256Mb Ram, 500Mb hard disc space, sound card and speakers.
- Phonica and An English Story are not supported on Apple Macintosh computers.
How can I monitor progress?
Phonica's unique online marking system allows you or your child's teacher to see exactly how well the child is going right down to performance on individual words.
Does Phonica fit in with my child's school teaching?
Any school giving evidence based reading instruction will find Phonica a great addition. The fact that material such as stories of interest to the child, school spelling lists and other homework can be simply and quickly loaded into the Phonica system, giving added assurance that Phonica is closely in step with school teaching.
What support is provided?
A technical support line is available to assist you with any part of the program.
Can parents and or teachers be involved?
Absolutely. We encourage involvement from parents or teachers and in fact the program has the capacity for parents to support the learning in an interactive way.
How long is each lesson?
The length of each lesson varies and it also depends on the level your child's reading. Because they can move at their own pace, some lessons may be quicker than others.
How long would it take for my child's reading to improve?
Once again, that would depend on where your child as an individual is at with their reading and the time commitment they make to the program.
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