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How Spelling Keeps Kids From Learning
The Atlantic ^ | February 9 ,2015 | Luba Vangelova

Posted on 02/10/2015 6:30:03 AM PST by C19fan

Johnny in Topeka can’t read, but Janne in Helsinki is effortlessly finishing his storybooks. Such a disparity may be expected by now, but the reason might come as a surprise: It probably has much less to do with teaching style and quality than with language. Simply put, written English is great for puns but terrible for learning to read or write. It’s like making children from around the world complete an obstacle course to fully participate in society but requiring the English-speaking participants to wear blindfolds.

Adults who have already mastered written English tend to forget about its many quirks. But consider this: English has 205 ways to spell 44 sounds. And not only can the same sounds be represented in different ways, but the same letter or letter combinations can also correspond to different sounds. For example, "cat," "kangaroo," "chrome," and "queue" all start with the same sound, and "eight" and "ate" sound identical. Meanwhile, "it" doesn’t sound like the first syllable of "item," for instance, and "cough" doesn’t rhyme with either "enough," "through," "furlough" or "bough." Even some identically spelled words, such as "tear," can be pronounced differently and mean different things.

(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: english; finnish; spelling
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This writer thinks learning to read/write English is too hard so we need to radically simplify English. Stealing from the Instapundit, Orwell's "1984" with Newspeak was a warning not a model.
1 posted on 02/10/2015 6:30:03 AM PST by C19fan
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To: C19fan
Start testing teachers yearly and fire the ones who are functionally illiterate. There are a LOT of them. The problem of teaching reading will then take care of itself.
2 posted on 02/10/2015 6:32:22 AM PST by E. Pluribus Unum (If obama speaks and there is no one there to hear it, is it still a lie?)
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To: C19fan

One of the wonders of English is that it is one of the most difficult of the Western languages therefore it exercises and expands the brain abilities with learning and use.

I assure you that Asian languages are even more difficult and certainly expand their users brain use and capacity.


3 posted on 02/10/2015 6:33:05 AM PST by Chickensoup (Leftist totalitarian fascism is on the move.)
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To: C19fan

Remember when people used to say “Nothing worth doing is easy”?

Now? Buncha whiners. ITS TOO HAAAAAAARRRRD.....

Gimme a break.


4 posted on 02/10/2015 6:33:13 AM PST by Personal Responsibility (Changing the name of a thing doesn't change the thing. A liberal or a rose by any other name...)
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To: C19fan

That’s why we were taught “context clues” in school in order to find which was the correct word to use if they sounded the same.


5 posted on 02/10/2015 6:34:37 AM PST by headstamp 2
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To: C19fan

U R RNG

/s


6 posted on 02/10/2015 6:34:47 AM PST by Iron Munro
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To: C19fan

Another example of defining deviancy down.


7 posted on 02/10/2015 6:36:09 AM PST by circlecity
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To: C19fan

Using this nimrod’s logic the Chinese should all be drooling morons considering haw many thousands of complicated pictographs they have to learn.

This author is part of the bunch of progressives that killed phonetics and make HS seniors incapable of reading at a 5th grade level.

Crap something up and then double down. Liberalism defined in seven words.


8 posted on 02/10/2015 6:36:27 AM PST by ChildOfThe60s (If you can remember the 60s, you weren't really there....)
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To: Iron Munro

Chinese is really hard.


9 posted on 02/10/2015 6:36:45 AM PST by JmyBryan
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To: C19fan

Ooooooo, spelling is sooooo hard.

So typically liberal.

Let’s see the idiot come up with schemes to make calculus easy.

Calculus....that’s the discipline that would totally explode both of Dormbama’s operational brain cells.


10 posted on 02/10/2015 6:37:04 AM PST by Da Coyote
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To: C19fan

We’re teaching our kids, at a very young age, the “secret code of ancient Americans” - cursive.


11 posted on 02/10/2015 6:38:31 AM PST by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: C19fan

And French words end with the sound ‘ewww’, ‘ou’ or something similar, regardless the spelling.


12 posted on 02/10/2015 6:39:09 AM PST by Vinnie
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To: C19fan

This is a ridiculous idea. For one thing, we cannot even agree on how to pronounce many words in this country. Throw England, Canada and Australia in, and you have a mess.

Standardize words like been, spigot, coyote etc. for starters. There are many, many more. England is a language with millions of words. “Standardizing” would make Shakespeare a foreign language, Faulkner would remain unreadable, and the OED would have to go in the dustheap, as too many words would have to be addressed.

Save these novelties for tiny Scandinavian tongues. Those of us who defend standard English already have our hands full with defending “awesome”, “impact” and “gender” from abuse, despite the fact that we are currently losing on all three fronts.

English is the current international language for a reason. It joyfully adds new words as needed, and those who only need business English can get by on a couple of thousand words.


13 posted on 02/10/2015 6:40:32 AM PST by Dr. Sivana (There is no salvation in politics)
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To: C19fan

If reading and writing English is such an obstacle to learning, why didn’t anyone notice it before?


14 posted on 02/10/2015 6:41:13 AM PST by reasonisfaith ("...because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved." (2 Thessalonians))
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To: C19fan

What idiocy. Phonics is simple and foolproof.


15 posted on 02/10/2015 6:41:32 AM PST by 9YearLurker
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To: Da Coyote

Spelling is hard when you never teach the kids spelling.

We know what works - phonics.

And our educational establishment is bound and determined not to teach it.


16 posted on 02/10/2015 6:41:39 AM PST by jdege
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To: C19fan
I remember learning spelling, phonics, cursive, and carrying the 1 when I was a kid.

Didn't hurt me none.
17 posted on 02/10/2015 6:42:01 AM PST by needmorePaine
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To: headstamp 2

“Context clues”? Sounds like “whole language”—the antithesis of simple phonics teaching—to me.


18 posted on 02/10/2015 6:42:41 AM PST by 9YearLurker
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To: needmorePaine

Do you know what the left’s opposition to phonics is?

That conservative parents use it to teach their kids to read hard words so that they can read the Bible.


19 posted on 02/10/2015 6:42:52 AM PST by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: C19fan

This is just another page from Satan’s playbook. He hates anything that smacks of rules, order, cleanliness, etc. He loves chaos. Anyone can “make up” their own language but the functioning of any society, nation or group depends on recognizable rules and standards that are followed by all. Even our Justice System is collapsing upon itself because there are no clear and consistent rules that apply to all.

You can look at just about any facet of life in these last days and see Satan’s efforts at creating chaos. He has plenty of willing accomplices to help him achieve his ends. May Our Lord come quickly.


20 posted on 02/10/2015 6:43:04 AM PST by Aleya2Fairlie
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