Phonics and spelling by school year

Every state school in England follows the National Curriculum, so the sounds, patterns and word endings a class works on are broadly the same from school to school. Pick your child's year to see what that year covers and which games match it.

• Reception ages 4–5
  Teaches 31 phonics sounds, grouped into basic words.
• Year 1 ages 5–6
  Teaches sounds spelt with two or three letters, like "sh", "ai" and "ow".
• Year 2 ages 6–7
  Teaches spelling patterns, including different ways to spell the same sound.
• Year 3 ages 7–8
  Teaches 4 prefixes and 6 suffixes that build new words from familiar ones.
• Year 4 ages 8–9
  Teaches 6 prefixes, the "shun"-sound family, and homophones like "here"/"hear".
• Year 5 ages 9–10
  Covers silent letters, word roots, and rarer spelling patterns.
• Year 6 ages 10–11
  Teaches 4 endings ("-cious", "-tious", "-cial", "-tial") and long, built-up words.

These pages follow the curriculum in England. Scotland (P1 to P7), Wales and Northern Ireland name their years differently and set their own curriculum — the games match those too, from the school-year picker inside the game.

Looking for US grades? See phonics and spelling by grade.