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The Campaigns Against the Western Manner of Learning to Read and Applying English Grammar
The Hot Gates 480BC ^ | Pleistarchos

Posted on 11/19/2012 3:00:43 PM PST by Pleistarchos

.... From there the regression into abandoning the teaching of reading to children was rapid. Teaching “reading” came to be viewed by many to be the act of repeatedly showing children flash cards in an effort to get them to recognize words by rote memorization as opposed to actually reading the words.

Fortunately for my eldest, this had not reached the elementary schools by the mid-90s and she was taught how to read and write. My youngest, though, was met with this like a freight train and the results were comparable with a train wreck. My youngest was a hard-working student, a pretty bright kid, and had no disabilities such as dyslexia+. When I saw what was going on, I approached the teacher, who clearly had been taken in by the smoke and mirrors of this system and was a strong advocate of effectively skipping steps one and two (Learning symbols for sounds (1) and having students apply that knowledge to letters placed together and have them learn to “sound them out”(2) ). She was, sadly, a very nice and clearly bright individual. In fact, I was more disappointed that this person, who was clearly no dolt, could not have seen that this flash-recognition system not only has no place in the teaching of reading to our youth but that it essentially and utterly ignores the very system that we have and utilize for reading and writing in the first place! Her response was that, with this system, “He will learn how to read like that “(Snaps her fingers) Well, my kid is in first grade and I don’t want him reading in a snap; I want him to learn how to read......

(Excerpt) Read more at thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com ...


TOPICS: Books/Literature; Education; History; Society
KEYWORDS: arth; illiterate; literacy; phonics; reading
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1 posted on 11/19/2012 3:00:53 PM PST by Pleistarchos
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To: Pleistarchos
(Excerpt) Read more at thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com ...

What seems to have caused you to excerpt your own material?

2 posted on 11/19/2012 3:06:19 PM PST by humblegunner
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To: Pleistarchos
Welcome to Free Republic.

Blog pimping is frowned upon on this forum.

3 posted on 11/19/2012 3:22:05 PM PST by rightly_dividing (Left behind; 4 Americans in Libya)
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To: Pleistarchos
The left attacked student ability to read over 60 years ago with their 'Dick and Jane' series of grade-school text books for first grade students. That assault was quickly identified by my foster mother at the time, who quickly taught me phonics.

Within a few weeks I was reading books well above grade level while my classmates continued to suffer.

Dyslexia is caused by this inane attack on reading ability, which has been proven time and again.

When my own son went to public school I had to step in and teach phonics to rescue him - his dyslexia disappeared soon after - and his reading ability improved to better than grade level.

4 posted on 11/19/2012 3:32:22 PM PST by Ron C.
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To: Pleistarchos; betty boop; marron; Alamo-Girl; little jeremiah; metmom; xzins; GodGunsGuts; ...

Another reason for the separation of School and State.


5 posted on 11/19/2012 3:44:33 PM PST by YHAOS
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To: humblegunner

I am new to this forum, but it seems to limit the body to 300 words, so I just cut a piece out to post here.


6 posted on 11/19/2012 3:50:08 PM PST by Pleistarchos
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To: rightly_dividing

What is blog pimping?

Does that mean one should not post his/her own posts?


7 posted on 11/19/2012 3:50:23 PM PST by Pleistarchos
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To: humblegunner; Pleistarchos

FR rules, articles from blogspot.com have to be excerpted.


8 posted on 11/19/2012 3:52:20 PM PST by Admin Moderator
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To: Pleistarchos
"The Western way" of teaching reading doesn't work ...

... the kids keep falling off the horses ...

9 posted on 11/19/2012 3:54:15 PM PST by x
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To: Pleistarchos; humblegunner

What is this blog-pimping of which you speak?

It is something with which we have no familiarity in my distant land.

Please send any helpful comments/advice to my very own vapid, content-free, ad-laden website—

www.f’nwhitey.bigfatorg

—and feel free to contribute at the donations link while you are there!


10 posted on 11/19/2012 4:02:45 PM PST by Fightin Whitey
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To: Pleistarchos
What this country's education system needs is some good old-fashioned Dominican nuns.
11 posted on 11/19/2012 4:10:35 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum (Government is the religion of the psychopath.)
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To: YHAOS

Quite right. When I was a kid, teachers were generally respected.

Are there any noble institutions remaining, unsullied by radical Leftists? I cannot name one.


12 posted on 11/19/2012 4:17:30 PM PST by Jacquerie ("How few were left who had seen the republic!" - Tacitus, The Annals)
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To: humblegunner
What seems to have caused you to excerpt your own material?

All I can say, humblegunner, is that his grammar and syntax do prove his point about how low our teaching of English has sunk.

13 posted on 11/19/2012 4:45:20 PM PST by BfloGuy (Workers and consumers are, of course, identical.)
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To: humblegunner
What seems to have caused you to excerpt your own material?

All I can say, humblegunner, is that his grammar and syntax do prove his point about how low our teaching of English has sunk.

14 posted on 11/19/2012 4:45:30 PM PST by BfloGuy (Workers and consumers are, of course, identical.)
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To: Ron C.

How odd - I learned to read with the Dick & Jane books when I was four and a half, and was reading on a 12th grade level when I was nine. I attended a small private school - no one I went to school with ever had dyslexia or reading problems of any kind. We also had French reading and grammar starting in first grade, and nobody seemed to have trouble with that either.


15 posted on 11/19/2012 4:48:39 PM PST by kabumpo (Kabumpo)
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To: YHAOS

School and State have been merged for decades....
which is big part of the problem..

The problem being voting has become rididulous..
On Nov. 6th voting has become obsolete..

It s a bit late for grousing about School and State..
However; many twits just barely WOKE UP...

Next; they will be whineing about “voter fraud”..
That horse has been gone from the barn for a few weeks..


16 posted on 11/19/2012 4:50:46 PM PST by hosepipe (This propaganda has been edited to include some fully orbed hyperbole..)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum
Know exactly what you mean. We had the Sisters of Mercy, we frequently thought they were misnamed! But we learned to read, write and recite those doggone multiplication tables.
17 posted on 11/19/2012 4:54:54 PM PST by pepperdog ( I still get a thrill up my leg when spell check doesn't recognize the name/word Obama!)
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To: Pleistarchos
My parents had no idea they were teaching me to read. They'd settle me in one lap or another or between them every evening for a story. At the ripe old age of three, I started to recognize words and insist on turning the pages myself. My mother told me years later she assumed I was simply memorizing stories, only to discover I was "sort of like reading" words I recognized. She was so delighted and sure I was a bona fide, qualified, certified little genius, she began to help me "sound out" words I didn't already know. She'd never heard of phonics at that point in her life: simply wanted to verify a hunch. My little sister learned to read the same way at the same age. Many and many years later, she read stories to her grandchildren, and by then was completely unsurprised they, too, learned to read long before starting school.

Given an opportunity and any small measure of encouragement, I believe, any child will painlessly and effortlessly start to read just because it's fun. Phonics beats the socks off word recognition, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone: letters represent sounds, and sounds are combined to form words.

18 posted on 11/19/2012 5:00:50 PM PST by Standing Wolf
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To: Jacquerie; hosepipe
"Are there any noble institutions remaining, unsullied by radical Leftists? I cannot name one.

It is the nature of looters to soil what they loot.

19 posted on 11/19/2012 5:19:31 PM PST by YHAOS
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To: hosepipe; Jacquerie
"It s a bit late for grousing about School and State.."

Losing can be a consequence, and is a natural risk of free elections. It is not a reason for surrendering, or giving up on that for which one is fighting.

20 posted on 11/19/2012 5:31:30 PM PST by YHAOS
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