Posted on 12/10/2018 4:23:07 PM PST by BruceDeitrickPrice
Sue Dickson is best known as the creator of Sing, Spell, Read, and Write, one of the most popular phonics programs. Now in her 80s, she is still active as ever, pushing phonics however possible, and refining a new approach.
The ups-and-downs in her career tell us a lot about the sad state of American education. In her college’s pre-teacher program, she was taught nothing about phonics. Not only that, when she started to teach first-grade, her superiors constantly emphasized their verdict that phonics is useless and even dangerous.
Sue Dickson recalls: “I was told that phonics doesn’t work, that the English language is too complicated to be taught that way. I accepted that reasoning hook, line and sinker. So, during my first two years as a teacher, I didn’t use any phonics even though I had lots of kids in trouble.”
But in 1955 her mother bought a book by Rudolf Flesch called Why Johnny Can’t Read. Dickson recalls, “At first I rejected his recommendations. After all, I was the one with the teaching degree. But my mother wouldn’t stop. She followed me around the house reading from that book!”
“Finally, I decided I had to do something because I was losing whole groups of students through the cracks. I would give phonics a try. There was considerable apprehension as my administrators were adamantly against it. They put a three-page memo in every teacher’s mailbox warning us to stay away from phonics!”
Then came the big shock. Her class scored so high on the standardized test that these same administrators seemed about to accuse her of cheating. Instead, they offered her a summer job teaching reading to students who were at least three years below the national norm. She never went back to teaching “look and say.”
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
My wife was not spared. I had to tutor several of our kids in reading and my basic text was Bob Books, a great phonics curriculum. When I explained basic rules like what a silent "e" at the end of a word does to the preceding vowel, my wife thought I was speaking Greek. She was never taught any of that.
So-called process teaching or factory teaching.
Teacher make presentation, kiddos get it or not, teacher (Unionized mostly) don’t need to know or care.
Phonics works. I learned to read that way. All of my siblings leaned to read using phonics.
The last time I took a test, I was off the scale to both speed and comprehension. Two of my brothers have a PhD, thee rest a MSc.
Dad? He worked as a lineman for the telco....
I went to a Catholic school in Los Gatos, CA. I can picture my orange paper “Phonix” workbook from 3rd grade - 1965ish....I credit that with being able to read and spell and decipher nearly any word...I love words and language....
I used the Bob Books too.With a family history of learning disabilities I switched to The Phonographics program it was a life saver in the Knick of time. MY Daughter is now a teacher and understands how important phonic based learning is.
It is spelled PHONOGRAPHIX
My sister’s little math darlings (7th grade inner city POCs, Baltimore) tell her “I don’t gots to learn...you gots to teach me.”
Around sixth grade, we were extensively studying Greek and Latin roots of English words together with a strong phonics background. I became fascinated by the etymology of words as a result.
Once you understand the Greek or Latin roots, suffixes, and prefixes, so many words become easy to decipher and understand.
Phonics works. Taught our kids to read before they started school.
The Cadillac of reading programs is “The Writing Road to Reading.” It was developed after much research in how the brain learns how to read. Dr. Samuel T. Orton, the earliest neuroscientist to research the functioning of the human brain in learning language skills, began working with brain-damaged WWI American veterans to help them relearn how to read and write. Dr. Orton used a very similar phonics base and collaborated with successful classroom teachers to combine his non-discriminating multi-sensory techniques with Classical Direct and Socratic instructional approaches to teaching. Other physiological organic or trauma-induced brain-damaged individuals (i.e. stroke patients) were treated similarly until his death in 1948. His method was modified for primary school children to both prevent and correct learning disorders, and most importantly to establish high literacy in virtually all primary children. The schools which use this method have students who can read and spell and write legibly. Interestingly, a spin of this program is used on kids to correct reading difficulties.
These are two great sources:
English is a tough enough language to learn, what with all the irregulars and huge vocabulary. Why keep the most effective tool to learn to read away from kids? Makes no sense.
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