[aruanan]

English is a phonetic language and must be learned phonetically. Whole Word, the opposing theory, is a mirage, without merit.

This is idiocy. The fact that English is a somewhat phonetic language makes it possible to predict what certain words that are familiar in spoken English may look like in written English such that they may be recognized if a reader is already familiar with them. It also makes it possible to produce a written form that can be recognized and understood by other English readers. It is undeniably true, though, that the number of written English words vastly outnumbers the number of spoken English words. It also does not follow that because English reading may be learned through the use of phonetic approaches that fluent English reading is done through a phonetic process. This is impossible. The speed at which it is performed in adult level fluent reading is far in excess of the time required to employ phonetic rules. Although a phonetic approach can enable a student to gain mastery over the written word in a comparatively easy fashion, compared to learning an idiogram-based language, the adult version of reading is not a phonetic process.

[Paradox]

the adult version of reading is not a phonetic process.

I was about to write some painful drivel, something probably nonsensical, that said essentially the same thing you have. You have said it much better than I though. Thank you!

[JRandomFreeper]

Unless the foundation is solid, the house is unsound.

Phonetics is the foundation. Practicing reading leads to sight reading over time.

But without the foundation... It doesn't work. The numbers show it. Phonetics was taught in grammar school for ages, and literacy rates were high for those that learned to read.

Phonetics was dropped, and literacy has fallen even though we have near-universal education.

/johnny

[Wingy]

...the adult version of reading is not a phonetic process.

Few adults learn to read. Children learn to read. Which process is best for children in order to learn the skill of reading? I'm 59 years old and I DO NOT read phonetically. However, 53 years ago it was the method that was used to teach me. In first grade I went from trying to make out words on the back of the Rice Krispys box to reading the jokes in The Readers Digest. Not a bad method for most people.

[Tony O]

It's like comparing an advanced class in a subject to a beginning class. Phoenetics provides the foundational tools for a child (or anyone for that matter) when challeged by a new written word, phoenetics are applied to translate the word into the imputed sound of the word if spoken. At that point context is added to the new word by the phoenetic association. “Whole Word” reading is adult reading, you see a word, you recognize and can speak it, and figure out the context. Neither is wrong, it's a matter of which process should be taught first.

[muawiyah]

One recent discovery is that as you track a line of text you simultaneously read the end of a word with the beginning of a word. For example: You have the word "Antidisestablishmentarianism" ~ you read "AN" and "SM" immediately. Your processing system matches that discovery against the context of the story line preceding the word "Antidisestablishmenarianism".

You might even say something like "Animalism" if you were reading it out loud and "animal" had anything to do with it.

If that doesn't make sense to you, you take another look at the word and check out what the other phonemes are telling you.

In short "WHOLE WORD" doesn't work by itself and neither does "PHOENICS". It's much more like reading hieroglyphics or ideograms than not.

Could be why the first successful writingsystem, Sumerian, was done in hieroglyphics. Er, so was the second, and the third, and the fourth, and so on.

Alphabets are a far more recent invention ~ pretty good for typing ~ not necessarily strictly phonic ~ more line linear hieroglyphs that are easily written.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Right, I use phonetics only when I come across an unfamiliar word.

[count-your-change]

The reading speed of a fluent reader is because most of a word structure is ignored as the eye saccades over the word gathering relevant information to make an identification of the word. Once done the eye can move on to the next word.

These saccades or eye movements are not smooth but occur in a jerky fashion and are involuntary. And we are completely unaware of them so our eyes might be jumping ahead to the next word and priming our expectations of what meaning to assign to that word.

[Windflier]

Your post is fallacious. English is a phonetic language, and is best taught that way.

[6SJ7]

Although a phonetic approach can enable a student to gain mastery over the written word in a comparatively easy fashion...

And that is the whole point. A child needs to know the fundamentals to know how to read. English is not pictographic. Yes, in time, a good reader reads "whole words", but one has to start with baby steps.

I still remember to this day when the concept of reading suddenly clicked in my brain. I learned by sounding out the letters of the words. Heaven help me if someone had dictated I learn by the "whole word" method. I likely would never have made the hurdle.

[FreedomPoster]

Phonetics is what allows a reader to be able to read and say a word like diethyldimethyltoluene without having encountered it before. Trying to learn the English language with Whole Word when it is 90% phonetic is absurd.