Phonics is a key skill for learning to read and spell; typically, phonics will be a class component for students of kindergarten and lower primary age. Students start with letter sounds and early decoding, progressing to and multi-syllable decoding, initial and final digraphs, diphthongs, suffixes, prefixes and further spelling patterns.

Emphasis is always placed on practical application, teachers guide students in using their acquired phonemic knowledge in the context of reading and spelling. Phonics taught in isolation is not an effective way of teaching children how to write and spell. All too often, after attending specific phonics courses, students have no real concept of how to apply phonics to reading and spelling. At EE phonics is considered and taught as one interlocking part of the larger mechanism that is English.