Return-Path: <nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov> Received: from literacy (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.10.2/8.10.2) with SMTP id i3O1Ujm01165; Fri, 23 Apr 2004 21:30:45 -0400 (EDT) Date: Fri, 23 Apr 2004 21:30:45 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <20040424012906.85529.qmail@web14302.mail.yahoo.com> Errors-To: listowner@literacy.nifl.gov Reply-To: nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov Originator: nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov Sender: nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov Precedence: bulk From: tom zurinskas <tzurinskas@yahoo.com> To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov> Subject: [NIFL-FOBASICS:1040] Use "visual cueing" for struggling readers? X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Status: O Content-Length: 3798 Lines: 88 Should teachers be instructed to ignore phonemic awareness and concentrate on pictures for struggling readers? See exerpt from a recent email below. "Earlier this week I went to an inservice for hundreds of teachers on ways to assist struggling readers in the primary grades. It was a disturbing experience from a number of vantage points. First was the complete lack of awareness (or attention to) the role of the alphabetic system or of auditory and phonological/phonemic skills in early reading. The emphasis was entirely on teaching children to use "strategies" to "predict" words, then to reread and "cross check" for meaning, etc. The incredible contortions required would strain the capabilities of a forensic scientist, never mind a young child. Despite the vibrant enthusiasm of the presenters, I failed to grasp how anyone thought children could learn to "love reading" if they had to engage in these exhausting mental gymnastics to read simple passages about planting seeds in the garden! The young instructional leaders (literacy experts from our Early Years project) reiterated the importance of using the "cueing systems." However, the "graphophonemic" had morphed into the "visual" cueing system -- there was no association with sound. Attention was to be paid to whether a word or letter "looked right" but not to whether the SOUND matched the representation given. Many pages of handouts were distributed about teaching strategies and important things to know about early literacy. Phonemic awareness, the alphabetic principle, and decoding were conspicuous by their absence. In fact, I am reasonably sure that the instructors did not know what, in fact, "decoding" is. They put up an overhead showing a running record and discussed what it implied for intervention. The child had correctly read most high-frequency words (the, of, what, etc. ), indicating a good sight vocabulary, but consistently missed easily decodable "content" words that were not "Dolch" words. The child had proffered other words that started with the same letter but only sometimes fit the story line. It was quite clear that the child had no awareness whatever of how to decode even simple, phonetically regular words (since these were missed) and had in fact been taught to "predict" using the first letter. After all, that's what 100% of our middle school poor readers do! We teach them to do it, and they learn very well. Amazingly, the presenters interpreted the running record as showing that the child was "overdependent on decoding." Say what? I've noticed that many "balanced" literacy people use the word "decoding" in a non-standard way. Their meaning is not always clear, but it does NOT mean (as it should) "using the alphabetic principle and code knowledge to arrive at an approximation of the spoken word." There seems to be no idea, indeed, that this is a skill that can even be taught. I don't think this presentation was an isolated example, either. At the required summer inservices for Early Years teachers, I've several times asked (diabolically) about phonemic awareness -- I kew better than to mention the forbidden "phonics" -- and found that the leaders did not know what it was. Sobering to consider, when this is the fourth largest school district in North America, and this is what all the new teachers are being taught." ===== Read “Truespel Book One: Analysis of the Sounds (Phonemes) of USA English http://www.1stBooks.com/bookview/16593 Convert text to truespel USA accent by copy/pasting text at: http://www.foreignword.com/dictionary/truespel/transpel.htm Read all about truespel at truespel.com. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Photos: High-quality 4x6 digital prints for 25˘ http://photos.yahoo.com/ph/print_splash
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