Current guidance from the Department for Education assumes that children can begin learning grapheme–phoneme correspondences from the start of Reception, and that phonics teaching will develop the skills needed to do this successfully.

In practice, this means children are introduced to graphemes from day 1, with the expectation that blending and segmenting will develop through phonics instruction.
 

The underlying assumption is that phonics will overcome early weaknesses in phonemic awareness and phonological working memory.

For a significant group of children, around 1 in 5, this does not happen. During our recommended pre-phonics phase these at-risk children are identified during Speech Sound Play activities. 
 

The skills phonics depends on
 

Phonics is an instructional method designed to teach young children the relationship between sounds and letters. It is dependent on children being able to hear, identify, and hold the sounds in spoken words, and to know what those words mean. It is a kick-start to the self-teaching of the full alphabetic code, which includes over 200 correspondences that teachers cannot teach explicitly and do not need to if self-teaching occurs without difficulties. The self-teaching phase must kick-in before year 2. That is, long before the Phonics Screening Check.
 

To access phonics, children need to be able to:
 

• hear the individual sounds in words

• segment and blend those sounds

• hold sound sequences in working memory

• understand what the words mean
   

Around 1 in 5 children begin school without these skills securely in place. Many also have speech, language and communication needs that impact phonemic awareness and phonological working memory.
 

These are the children most at risk of struggling to learn phonics. Many will later say that phonics “did not work for them”. We argue that their needs were not met through synthetic phonics programmes and that they needed more from their phonics instruction.
 

Key risk factors in the early years
 

According to Delphi Study findings and the SpLD Assessment Standards Committee (SASC) practice framework, the most significant early indicators relevant to children on school entry include:
 

• Oral language difficulties: persistent speech or language delays that often precede literacy challenges

• Phonological processing weaknesses: difficulty hearing, blending, and segmenting sounds

• Rapid automatised naming (RAN): slow naming speed linked to later reading fluency difficulties

• Working memory: poor verbal short-term memory, affecting the ability to hold and manipulate sound sequences
   

These are not gaps that can be assumed to resolve through synthetic phonics programme content alone.
 

The problem with starting at graphemes (print to speech)
 

When children with weak speech–sound processing are introduced to graphemes immediately, they are expected to map print to sounds that are not yet secure. 

For these children, phonics does not close the gap. It exposes it.

This is why some children appear to “fall behind” despite receiving the same teaching as their peers.

Speech Sound Play starts with speech sounds, and introduces graphemes as a way to explain how we can talk on paper. 

Preventing the dyslexia paradox
 

Without early identification, many children are only recognised once they have already struggled, often around ages 6 to 7.

This is the dyslexia paradox. The children who most need early support are the least likely to receive it in time.

By this point, gaps have widened, confidence has reduced, and intervention becomes more complex.

Why ages 5 to 7 matter

The period from ages 5 to 7 is critical for establishing the link between speech and print.

If phonemic awareness and phonological working memory are weak at this stage, children may struggle to form accurate word representations. Reading can become guesswork. Spelling can rely on memorisation rather than understanding.

Early difficulties at this stage compound quickly if not addressed.

Moving away from “wait and see”

The consensus across research and parent voice in the Delphi study is clear. The “wait and see” approach is a major barrier to effective support.

Instead, early identification and immediate action are needed.

A pre-phonics phase that makes phonics accessible

The Dyslexia Risk Screener (DRS), embedded within the Speech Sound Play Plan, provides a short pre-phonics phase that can be used by any Reception teacher, regardless of the synthetic phonics programme they will then use. It is already used across Australia by those using the Speech Sound Pics Approach, and we are adapting it for use in England. Although the Phonemies are introduced as IPA-aligned speech sound symbols, for a range of reasons, including accent variation, they can be phased out when your programme begins. However, it is recommended that a teaching assistant continues to support children identified as at risk through a Ten Minutes a Day, With a TA model.

This phase:

• identifies children at risk at school entry

• strengthens phonemic awareness and phonological working memory

• supports children with Speech, Language and Communication Needs

• prepares children to access phonics successfully

This is not a delay. It is the first step in preventing failure.

Recommendations for early support;
 

• Universal dyslexia risk screening (DRS) before formal synthetic phonics begins
  Identify at-risk children at the start of Reception using the Speech Sound Play Plan

• Immediate intervention
  Provide targeted support as soon as risks are identified, without waiting for failure or a formal diagnosis

• Specialist input where needed (we offer TEP training to SEN specialists)
  Refer for full assessment if there is limited progress after 6 to 12 months of targeted support (we will offer a directory of recommended assessors)
   

The goal is to prevent the need for intervention in Year 2 and beyond.
 

The role of Reception and Year 1

Reception and Year 1 teachers are in a position to prevent long-term reading and spelling difficulties.

By identifying the 1 in 5 children at risk before phonics begins, and by providing the right support from the start, outcomes can be changed.

Phonics works best when children can access the sounds it teaches. Early screening and targetted 1:1 suppert ensures that no-one is left behind at the starting point.