Posted on 08/29/2022 7:31:52 PM PDT by Jamestown1630
I have a question that I hope someone here can help with – especially if you taught elementary school education in the late 1950s to early 1960s or have knowledge of public education history of that era.
I remember nothing about how I learned to read!
I recall that my parents never really talked ‘baby talk’ to us; as soon as we were able to learn words and speak, they spoke to us in more or less adult language. So, I grew up knowing a lot of words, and probably using a lot of them without really knowing them except by inference.
But I don’t recall having any instruction in the alphabet and spelling until I actually went to school, in September of 1958; and I can’t for the life of me remember how I learned to read!
I recall a little about singing the alphabet in school and learning to write letters (big fat pencils on lined paper almost like newsprint :-), but the rest – for all I recall – was just picked up through some kind of ‘osmosis’.
I know I became an avid reader at a young age, but can’t figure out how I got there.
Is there anyone here who knows the techniques that were used in public schools in those days, or can recommend any old books or manuals about this?
Thanks very much!
-JT.
PHONICS.
Rod and Staff Phonics.
It’s the Mennonite publishing house and is supposed to be for 1st and 2nd grade, but the second grade material is pretty advanced.
And read to the kids. One of the best ways to get kids to read is to spend time reading to them.
My mom taught me to read.
I remember learning to read using the “Look-Say” method in the Fargo, N.D. public schools in the first and second grades about 1955 and 1956. I remember the Dick, Jane, Sally, Spot and Puff books. I remember the first and only word on the first page of the first book: LOOK.
When I can get on my main computer, I will ping the regular homeschool ping list.
Homeschoolers will have some more ideas.
I’m slightly younger but my school was actually still using Phonics. I remember workbooks with dipthongs (ch, th, ng, etc., ending -e, long vowels, short vowels, how to sound out words. Eventually we moved up to sight reading (later called Whole Language) but we were taught the sound of unknown words before we were expected to digest chunks of “Dick and Jane run! Run, Dick, run!”
I don’t recall that. I know that we heard the term a lot later.
I do know that we did ‘sound out’ the sounds of letters, and maybe I just don’t remember.
I’d really like to find an old instructional book that was used in that era.
Like another poster said “Dick and Jane”. That was best instruction.
English is a mix of languages and sounds.
Phonics is the backbone, but memorization of words is essential to fluency and understanding.
A mixture of methods is required.
the letter Aa looks like this and makes an ay sound or uh.
phonics baby.
1946-Dick & Jane. Some time about half way or so through the first grade, the teacher brought out the Dick & Jane books and all of us soon learned to read the relatively simple words. Next grade was smaller print and bigger words.
I remember in 1st grade, the teacher had letter combinations on the chalk board. (She had a multi-chalk holder to make the lines.) We’d all sound them out.
Br, th, ph, etc.
i before e except after c.
Alphabet song with alphabet printed out for them to follow along. Then start with the short words which teaches them letter pronunciation and usage. Cat, dog etc etc. All singular sounds on the letters. No combo letters or sounds yet like sh.
If you’re eulexic, you’ll skip phonics. This doesn’t work for the general population, but some people (e.g. the original poster and me) get reading right away. By the second grade I was reading hundreds of pages a day, and you can’t do that by sounding out words.
Phonics, and I knew the alphabet and times tables up to 12 and could read by the first grade, but I was born with White Privilege and Gods gift to humanity, today they call it ADD and ADHD and give you drugs to stop it.
PHONICS . . . . and no round robin reading (everyone taking a turn to read outloud) . . bad for comprehension. Always discuss with the child what he or she read. Reading is one thing but understanding what you read is another. I worked for a Regional Office of Education for umpteen years and offered workshops and also visited classrooms. You would be surprised the number of classrooms where (even in history classes, etc.) students were taking turns reading. I have a problem with it even in church and have encouraged teachers not to have the read alouds in for both adult and children . . . I also have noted it is often those who can’t read who volunteer to do so!
What others said: phonics. We learned short and long vowels with the symbols and consonants, whether they were hard or soft. Then we learned the digraphs like “ph”, “ch”, “th”, etc.
I was in elementary school in the sixties.
I remember ‘Dick and Jane’.
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