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Important update from TheSchoolRun
For the past 13 years, TheSchoolRun has been run by a small team of mums working from home, dedicated to providing quality educational resources to primary school parents. Unfortunately, rising supplier costs and falling revenue have made it impossible for us to continue operating, and we’ve had to make the difficult decision to close. The good news: We’ve arranged for another educational provider to take over many of our resources. These will be hosted on a new portal, where the content will be updated and expanded to support your child’s learning.
What this means for subscribers:
- Your subscription is still active, and for now, you can keep using the website as normal — just log in with your usual details to access all our articles and resources*.
- In a few months, all resources will move to the new portal. You’ll continue to have access there until your subscription ends. We’ll send you full details nearer the time.
- As a thank you for your support, we’ll also be sending you 16 primary school eBooks (worth £108.84) to download and keep.
A few changes to be aware of:
- The Learning Journey weekly email has ended, but your child’s plan will still be updated on your dashboard each Monday. Just log in to see the recommended worksheets.
- The 11+ weekly emails have now ended. We sent you all the remaining emails in the series at the end of March — please check your inbox (and spam folder) if you haven’t seen them. You can also follow the full programme here: 11+ Learning Journey.
If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected]. Thank you for being part of our journey it’s been a privilege to support your family’s learning.
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Reception Reading worksheets
Short vowel sounds worksheet
A short vowel sound is pronounced for a shorter time than a long vowel sound. For instance, in the word fat, the vowel 'a' is short, but in fate, it's long. Use this worksheet to practise short vowel sounds and consolidate your child's phonics learning at home.
Long vowel sounds 'a' and 'e'
A long vowel is pronounced for a longer time than a short vowel sound. In the word mat, the vowel 'a' is short, but in mate, it's long. Use this worksheet to practise the long vowel sounds 'a' and 'e' and consolidate your child's phonics learning at home.
The long vowel 'u'
Long vowels are vowel sounds that are pronounced for a longer time than short vowels. In the word cut, the vowel 'i' is short, but in cute, it's long. Use this worksheet to practice the long vowel sounds 'u' and consolidate your child's phonics learning at home.
Long vowel sounds 'i' and 'o'
Long vowels are vowel sounds that are pronounced for a longer time than short vowels. They can change the meaning of words. In the word bit, the vowel 'i' is short, but in bite, it's a long vowel sound. Use this worksheet to practice long vowel sounds 'i' and 'o' and consolidate your child's phonics learning at home.
Finding rhyming words
Help your child listen to sounds and identify rhyming words with this Reception activity sheet.
Phonics phases sound mats
Use our free phonics phases sound mats to see what sounds your child will be taught when in their phonics learning journey. These mats cover phonics phases 2-5.
Roll a CVC word (Phase 2 phonics)
Using two consonant dice and a vowel die, play this simple phonics game with your Reception child and roll and write CVC words.
Connect 4: words with ‘ll’ endings (Phase 2 phonics)
A downloadable, printable Connect 4-style game to help children practise reading words with 'll' endings as part of Phase 2 phonics learning in Reception.
The /ure/ sound (Phase 3 phonics)
Read these words with /ure/ sound then make up your own sentences using these ‘ure’ words.
The /ee/ sound (Phase 3 phonics)
When we put two ee letters together we write the long vowel sound /ee/. Look at these pictures. How would you write these words? Now have a go at reading these sentences.
Writing b and d (Phase 2 phonics)
The letters b and d are often confused by children when they are earning to read. Show them this mnemonic to help them remember which is which, then practise writing b and d. Then, using the phoneme frame, put the b at the beginning of the word and the d at the end. Keep changing the vowel to see what the new word says.
Two-syllable words jigsaw (Phase 3 phonics)
Lots of words end in -ng or -er, making two-syllable words. Try adding these words to the endings -ing and -er to see how many new words you can make. Then cut out the jigsaw pieces and match together the first and second syllable to make a real word.
The trigraph ‘igh’ (Phase 3 phonics)
In the phoneme frame below keep changing the first letter to read different words. How many different words can you come up with? Then answer these yes or no questions, then make up some of
your own using the ‘igh’ words.
your own using the ‘igh’ words.
The /ow/ sound puzzle (Phase 3 phonics)
When we put the letters o and w together we get the sound /ow/ – it sounds just like the sound you might say if you hurt yourself! Read the sentences in the puzzle pieces and then draw a picture to go
with the sentence. Then cut each of the sentence and picture pieces apart and see if somebody can put them back together again.
with the sentence. Then cut each of the sentence and picture pieces apart and see if somebody can put them back together again.
The /er/ sound (Phase 3 phonics)
Practise reading these ‘er’ words and then finding and highlighting the /er/ sound in the sentences below.
The /ear/ sound (Phase 3 phonics)
In the phoneme frame, keep changing the first letter to read different /ear/ words. How many different words can you come up with? Write them down and then use them to make up your own sentences then read the short sentences and fill in the missing word.
The /air/ sound (Phase 3 phonics)
In the phoneme frame below, keep changing the first letter to read different words. How many different words can you come up with? Write them down and then use them to make up your own sentences. Then have a game of pairs with these /air/, /igh/ and /ear/ sound words.
The /ai/ sound (Phase 3 phonics)
When we put the letters a and i together we make the phoneme /ai/. Can you write the words under these pictures using the /ai/ sound spelled ‘ai’? Then cut out these words, read them and sort them
into piles of rhyming words.
into piles of rhyming words.
Spelling patterns: c and k (Phase 2 phonics)
Which of these words DO NOT start with a c or k? Now cut out and put together these two dice. Roll both dice together and see if when you put the single letter in front of the ending if you get a real word or a silly word.
Spelling patterns: ‘er’ and ‘ur’ (Phase 3 phonics)
The graphemes ‘er’ and ‘ur’ make the same sound, /er/. Read the sentences below then cut out the word cards and play bingo