QUADS Introduces My BZ Phonics

The Ministry of Education, through the Quality Assurance Development Service, is rolling out a new program to assist primary school children at the beginner level with reading.  This morning, QUADS introduced My BZ Phonics, a locally flavored book which builds on the reading method involving letter recognition.  According to Acting Director John Newport, the idea is to strengthening literacy skills of children going into Infant Two.  The publication, says Newport, also teaches students about Belize through pictures and other illustrations.

John Newport, Acting Director, QUADS

“We’re launching a new phonics program which is My BZ Phonics and the BZ is not because we forgot the A but because it’s Belize.  It’s a Belizean phonics book and what this book does is it launches exciting, new, multi-sensory, multiple intelligence ways of teaching children how to learn to read.  And so what we are aiming to do is to ensure through this book and through the supporting materials that every single infant one child gets a very good foundation in reading.  So when they go into Infant Two they are already reading sentences and they are doing well at school.”

John Newport

Isani Cayetano

“Give us a brief synopsis of what the book contains and what the are the specific phonic or phonetic lessons in it.”

John Newport

“So what phonics is.  Phonics is understanding that there is a connection between sounds in speech and letters.  What people don’t always realize is that when we read what we’re doing is that we’re translating letters into speech sounds to make words.  And this is one of the things which is very new with phonics, the sound awareness is a crucial part of learning to read.  So what My BZ Phonics does is it introduces sounds.  It introduces for example the sound A and it does that with a picture, it does that with a story, it does that with an action, it does it with a rhyme and so students learn the sounds in lots and lots of different ways.”