What to Ask About Reading at Parents' Evening

You get about ten minutes, you are sitting on a very small chair, and the teacher has forty of these to get through. The single most useful thing you can do is arrive with three specific questions about reading rather than one general one. "How is she doing?" produces a reassuring answer that tells you almost nothing. "Which sounds is she still mixing up?" produces something you can act on before Christmas. Below are the questions worth the slot, in the order I would ask them.

What a ten minute slot is actually for

It is not for a full account of your child's year. The teacher will give you the headline, which is usually some version of "on track" or "we are keeping an eye on it", and the headline is genuinely useful. What the slot is really for is the detail underneath it: what is being taught right now, where your child sits inside that, and what you should be doing at home this month rather than in general.

Pick three questions from this list. Write them down. You will forget them otherwise, because the chair is small and the corridor is loud.

1. Which phonics programme do you use, and where is my child in it right now?

Surprisingly few parents can name their school's programme, and it changes what every other answer means. You want two things: the name, and the current stage. "Little Wandle, Reception Spring 1" tells you your child is meeting ai, ee, igh, oa, oo, ar, or, ur, ow, oi, ear, air and er this half term. "Bug Club, Red 2" tells you roughly the same territory under different names. "Read Write Inc, Set 2" tells you the twelve sounds ay, ee, igh, ow, oo, oo, ar, or, air, ir, ou and oy.

Write the answer down exactly as they say it, including any number or colour. If you want to decode it later, the scheme identification guide matches the words to the programme.

2. Is the book in the bag matched to what you have already taught?

Nearly always yes, and it is worth hearing it said out loud, because the book coming home is meant to be easy and parents routinely read that as a problem. In many schools the book has already been read three times in class that week: once for decoding, once for expression, once for comprehension. The read at home is the fourth. That is why it looks too easy. It is practice, not a test.

If the school uses Read Write Inc, ask specifically about the Book Bag Book. It is a different story from the Storybook read in class, built from the same sounds and the same green words. Parents lose whole evenings to that one.

3. What does my child do when they get stuck?

This is the highest value question on the list and almost nobody asks it. The answer tells you whether your child is decoding or guessing. A child who stops, looks at the word and starts sounding it out is doing the right thing, however slowly. A child who looks at the picture, or at the adult's face, or produces a word with roughly the right shape, has a habit that will quietly cap their progress.

Guessing from pictures is precisely the habit decodable books exist to prevent, so if the teacher mentions it, take it seriously and cover the pictures at home.

4. How is the blending itself?

Blending is the mechanical heart of it. Some children know every sound on the mat and still cannot push them together into a word, which is a different problem from not knowing the sounds and needs a different fix. Ask whether your child can get from separate sounds to a whole word without help, and whether it is happening faster than it was in September.

Ask, too, whether any particular sounds are being confused. The usual suspects are visually similar letters and the vowel digraphs that sound close, and knowing which two your child muddles is far more useful than knowing that "phonics is coming on".

5. Which tricky words are we on?

Every programme has a set of words that cannot be sounded out yet and simply have to be known. Little Wandle sends home is, I and the in the first half term, then a longer list including put, pull, full, as, and, has, his, her, go, no, to, into, she, push, he, of, we, me and be. Read Write Inc calls them red words and tells children to stop and think rather than sound them out. Essential Letters and Sounds calls them harder to read and spell words.

Get the current list. When one of them appears at home and your child stalls, the correct move is to say the word, let them carry on, and come back to it another day.

6. Is my child in any extra group, and what happens in it?

Many schools run short daily catch-up sessions, sometimes called keep-up, for children who missed a sound or need another pass at blending. This is normal, it is usually brief, and it is a sign the system is working rather than a verdict on your child. Ask what it covers, how often it runs, and what would tell the school it is no longer needed.

If the teacher raises a broader concern, the right response is questions rather than a diagnosis. Ask what they are seeing, what they are already doing, and when you should check in again.

Ten minutes is not long enough for a general update. It is plenty for three precise questions.

7. If my child is in Year 1, where are we with the screening check?

The phonics screening check is taken in June of Year 1. A teacher sits with the child one to one and they read 40 words aloud: 20 real words and 20 made-up ones, the made-up ones printed beside a small alien so the child knows not to search for a meaning. The pseudo words are the whole point, because they cannot be recognised from memory or guessed from the picture, so what is left is decoding.

A threshold mark is published each June. It has been 32 out of 40 for many years, though it is set annually rather than fixed, so treat it as indicative. The headteacher must report your child's score to you by the end of the summer term, and children who do not meet the standard are considered for a retake the following June with support in between. The official arrangements are published on gov.uk.

What you want from the teacher is not a prediction. It is whether there is anything specific to work on between now and June.

8. What should five minutes a night actually look like?

Ask this and you will usually get something practical: read the book bag book once, do the sound cards twice a week, stop when it stops being fun. Teachers are good at this question because it is the one they wish parents asked.

If nothing else comes back, the default is dull and effective. Wait five seconds before helping, because most children get there at four. When they genuinely cannot, give the sounds rather than the word, so "s-t-o-p" hands them the win. Stop while they still want more. And keep reading aloud to them from books far harder than anything they can decode, because that track carries the vocabulary and the appetite. If evenings have turned into a fight, this is worth reading first.

9. What would you like me to stop doing?

An odd question, and the one that gets the most honest answer. Teachers see the consequences of well meant home habits: sounding out tricky words that cannot be sounded out, correcting mid sentence, pushing on to a harder book, saying "sound it out" to a child who is already trying. Nobody volunteers this. Asked directly, most teachers will tell you, kindly.

What to do with the answers

Put the programme name and stage in your phone. Keep the tricky word list on the fridge. Change one habit, not five. Then leave it alone until the next slot, because progress in phonics is measured in half terms and checking every night helps nobody.

If the answers left you unsure what the book bands mean, the Bug Club band breakdown is a useful example of how one programme labels its stages, and most of the others work the same way under different names.

Lindo Phonics is not connected to Bug Club, Pearson, Little Wandle, Read Write Inc or Essential Letters and Sounds, and is not endorsed by them. We match the published progression so a story only uses sounds your child has already been taught.