Why some parents want changes to Ontario's early reading curriculum | CBC News

#1

I guess the commercial educators at “Hooked on Phonics” and “Grammarly”, to name only two such entities, route to learning isn’t working out so well.

“Collier says that while phonemic awareness is important, she believes there is a lot more to literacy than just decoding letters, arguing the “three-cueing” method still has a place in our education system. She points to a lack of proof of the power of a phonics-intensive approach.”

Lack of proof? Wow! Talk about too much knowledge from the college!
Just try asking people who were not educated under this current useless education system. I was reading complete children’s novels in 1972 when I was 7 years old and I wasn’t the only one! Its not like Gates was some kind of child reading prodigy.

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#2

American English is one of the most bizarre languages that has ever existed in this galaxy I am not a fan of future generations being indoctrinated into this nonsensical system of letters.

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#3

One side says that basic phonemic awareness is the key to literacy. The other argues that phonemic awareness plays a smaller role, and that cultural context clues are key to deriving meaning from text.

Wow… If anybody wonders how the English-speaking world fell into idiocracy, just skim this article. Consider that the population is being taught by “educators” capable of taking seriously the proposition that it’s not important to know how to pronounce words, but instead “cultural context clues are key to deriving meaning from text”!

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#4

I don’t read that as saying pronunciation is unimportant, but that cultural context can be very important too, as in if someone is brandishing a spear at you and shouting that does affect interpretation of spoken words.

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#5

At issue is interpreting the written word, not the spoken word.

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#6

Respectfully, what is the difference between written and spoken, in this context?

The English language is highly idiomatic, either way.

The people speaking or writing the words are doing so through the prism of their culture and language at the time. What possible other method is there to understand them if the translator refuses to engage with that same view?

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#7

that is an important distinction in the quote “deriving meaning from text,” a lot can be lost between when something is written to when it is read more so than with spoken words generally

and then there is the entirely different prism and frame of understanding in how text is read, as in reading a book in silence is completely different than listening to someone else narrate text or enact what was written

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#8

No doubt, text conveys tone poorly compared to the spoken word, but you dance with the girl you brung.

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#9

What I take issue with is the belief that “cultural context clues are key to deriving meaning from text” and that “phonemic awareness plays a smaller role” in deriving meaning from text. I’d argue that in order to read and write, you first and foremost have to learn what sounds the various combinations of letters represent – i.e., basic phonemic awareness is key.

The spoken word is a separate issue. You can learn and speak a language without ever seeing a text. Children learn the spoken language first, without reference to writing. In that context – where you’re only dealing with spoken words – visual, environmental, and cultural cues are indeed key to deriving meaning from words. Text is a different thing altogether.

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#10

I do not deny the importance., or indeed, the primacy of understanding the mechanics of words. including their pronunciation. You can see this in action with any small child(or anyone else) sounding out simple words not long after they master the alphabet…they can’t control or understand it until they can speak it’s name, as the old lore goes.

What I take issue with is the idea that you don’t need to take account of “cultural context clues” to deriving meaning from text, AFTER that first part. I don’t understand how you can translate simple metaphors or idioms in even your first language without doing so, neverlone how you deal with a concept like gnosticism.

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#11

I’d agree with that. After learning the mechanics of spelling and pronunciation of written words, you absolutely need some understanding (the more, the better) of the culture that a text comes from in order to derive an accurate understanding of its intended meaning.

My impression is that there’s a current of thinking in contemporary education according to which you don’t need to focus much on that crucial first step of learning the mechanics. If so, I don’t think it’s a good idea.

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#12

That could be true in some schools but it varies greatly depending on what schools you are talking about. A lot of the European-based curriculum in north American schools is often overly focused on the mechanics of a language to the expense of the original culture of the language they are teaching or that of the population they are teaching a language to.

Here is an essay about early English education of the native people of the pacific northwest, where children were disciplined severely for speaking in their native languages:

https://content.lib.washington.edu/aipnw/marr.html

" The foremost requirement for assimilation into American society, authorities felt, was mastery of the English language. Commissioner of Indian Affairs T.J. Morgan described English as “the language of the greatest, most powerful and enterprising nationalities beneath the sun.” Such chauvinism did not allow for bilingualism in the boarding schools. Students were prohibited from speaking their native languages and those caught “speaking Indian” were severely punished. Later, many former students regretted that they lost the ability to speak their native language fluently because of the years they spent in boarding school."

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