What is the KS1 spelling curriculum?
The KS1 spelling curriculum is the statutory spelling content for Year 1 and Year 2 in the National Curriculum for England, set out in English Appendix 1: Spelling. It covers the content of Letters and Sounds Phases 5 and 6, and it moves some Phase 3 graphemes into Year 1. Children who are ready can begin it in Reception.
What children need to know before they start
- all the letters of the alphabet and the sounds they most commonly represent;
- the consonant digraphs they have been taught and the sounds they represent;
- the vowel digraphs they have been taught and the sounds they represent;
- how to segment spoken words into sounds before choosing graphemes to represent them; and
- how to read and spell words with adjacent consonants.
How the KS1 spelling curriculum improves on Letters and Sounds
- It teaches the link between pronunciation and spelling explicitly, for example the three different ways of pronouncing the past tense ending -ed.
- It includes common exception words, which young children often find hard to read, spell and pronounce.
- Its word lists are more relevant to children. Letters and Sounds included unfamiliar words such as woe, doe and foe for rarer graphemes.
- Its word lists include past tense words, which children need for reading and writing stories.
- Spelling rules and grammar are taught throughout Key Stage 1 rather than left to Phase 6, so children learn each rule alongside the words it applies to.
Common exception words and high-frequency words
The curriculum describes exception words as words containing graphemes that have not yet been taught as widely applicable, often because they appear in very few age-appropriate words. You can see the full lists on our Year 1 common exception words and Year 2 common exception words pages. Monster Phonics colour coding links each part of these words to its sound, which helps children remember them. When first teaching a pattern, present words that share the same grapheme together; once children recognise the pattern, practise the words in a random order to consolidate them. The curriculum does not set a list of high-frequency words, and leaves the choice to the scheme a school follows. Monster Phonics teaches the first 300 high-frequency words, which make up around 65% of all printed words.
How Monster Phonics teaches the KS1 spelling curriculum
Monster Phonics covers every element of the KS1 spelling curriculum, with lesson plans and resources in the Year 1 and Year 2 sections of the platform. Formative and end of year assessments cover phonics, spelling rules, common exception words and high-frequency words, and are aligned to the Year 1 Phonics Screening Check and end of Key Stage 1 teacher assessment. Monster Phonics adds to the curriculum word lists with research into the 3,000 words children use most in their own reading and writing. These words are the basis for every activity, song, game and story, so each grapheme is linked to words children already know: ai in rain, sail and train, and a-e in made, take and came. Lesson plans also show which spellings of a sound are most common, which helps children choose well when they do not know a spelling. For example, words ending in the “ul” sound are far more likely to end in le than in el, il or al, and learning the most frequent el, il and al words helps children rule them in or out. Lessons also highlight links to spelling rules and give useful background on each grapheme.
Flashcards for Key Stage 1
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Letters and Sounds phases
Monster Phonics covers all of the content in Letters and Sounds. Read about Letters and Sounds and its six phases. Tricky and high-frequency words are taught alongside phonics throughout, as well as in the KS1 spelling curriculum. Read more about tricky and high-frequency words.