The pass mark for the phonics check is 32 out of 40, the government announced today.

It is the seventh year in a row that the phonics check pass mark has been 32.

More than 600,000 year 1 children have taken the phonics check in the last two weeks.

The phonics check is a list of 40 words  - 20 of them are real, 20 are nonsense words, such as “quass”  - these are denoted with a monster to make it clear to children that they are the monster’s “names”.

The nonsense words are included to show that children are using their knowledge and have not merely memorised words.

The children read the words aloud to their teacher and the teacher marks them. But the pass mark has not been revealed until today.

The phonics check materials published today reveal that the words children were tested on this year included: reb, wup, strike, delay and modern.