A tutor's guide to running phonics groups
Meera Iyer · Tutor Community14 July 2026 · 1 min read
Group by sound, not by age
A six-year-old and a seven-year-old on short vowels belong together; two six-year-olds at different levels don't. Assess with a quick sounds check, then group by where children actually are.
The 45-minute frame
Ten minutes of review games as children arrive. Twenty minutes on the new sound with whiteboards. Ten minutes of decodable reading in pairs. Five minutes of celebration and a note home about what to practise.
Let the platform carry the drill
Tutors we work with use PhonicSky for the repetition — the listen-and-tap practice children happily do solo — and keep their precious live minutes for blending coaching and confidence building.