[senco-forum] Literacy

Brendan,

Sorry, maybe I was getting confused by Barbara's interpretation of what Eddie said: 

"

hat happens in reception / year 1 is of vital importance - teaching
synthetic phonics ( I would just say decoding but then I use toe by toe 
so
lets use the 'in' words -synthetic phonics) gives the vast majority
-according to forum 80% -of kids the necessary skills to tackle more 
than
just 'look and say' words.

Fine - but that leaves us with the 20% for whom this is not the 
preferred approach although it may help them a little (
 "

It looks to me as if she is taking Eddie's statement to mean that 20% of children won't learn to read with synthetic phonics, whereas the figures Eddie & I quote relate to children who have been taught to read by the noe convential 'mixed methods', as exemplified by the old National Literacy Strategy 'Searchlights' model.  it was THAT that failed 20% of children.  Not synthetic phonics!

Maggie

P.S I hope this message comes out right, it's doing funny things in my 'composition' frame!

kngbrndn at aol.com wrote:  Maizie -- I shouldn't be speaking for Eddie -- but your statistics are similar to his. If you read all of his recent postings carefully -- he is saying that only about 2-1/2% of children fail to read by use of SP. He says (from my recollection) that 80% of children will learn to read quickly by whatever method (he actually gives a phonogical/cognitive explaination). He states that a 20% cohort only will require a period of intensive SP. Not far from your statistics. His small percentage of those who he conceeds may not respond to SP and who have specific difficulties (maybe caused by early glue ear as one cause) are his response to the many who come across this small cohort and argue that they require ongoing speciailst input using a wider range of approaches to remediaition. Don't misinterperate him or he'll go off forum again. Let's all have a happy and literate/meaningful New Year -- Brendan   

 -----Original Message-----
 From: maizie2004 at yahoo.co.uk
 To: senco-forum at lists.becta.org.uk
 Sent: Sat, 30 Dec 2006 11.16PM
 Subject: RE: [senco-forum] Literacy

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I'm very curious as to where this figure of 20% of children who can't learn to 
read with synthetic phonics has come from.  In the Clackmannanshire study I 
believe it was only about 5% of the children who still struggled and the ones 
who were given more intensive phonics teaching did learn and improve.  I think 
there is a bit of muddlement going on here!

Bonnie MacMillan, in her book 'Why Schoolchildren Can't Read' says that 50% of 
children will learn to read whatever the method (because they work out the 
phonic principles for themselves; and I recently had a Y11 boy tell me how he 
did exactly that), 25% will learn to read, but never spell very well and 25% 
will be baffled!  I don't have any references for her statement, but I'm sure 
she didn't pull her figures out of thin air!

Ruth Miskin, at the recent RRF conference said that she reduced her SEN register 
to 8 children.  Sue Lloyd (developer of Jolly Phonics) told me that in a long 
teaching career she only had ONE child who failed to learn to read.  A poster on 
the TES forums, who works with  children with hearing difficulties, said that 
s/he had only very rarely encountered children who could not learn to read with 
synthetic phonics, and that was usually because they had had  a severe 
impairment (such as glue ear) at a crucial point in their early childhood.  Now, 
this may be anecdotal evidence, but it cannot be that these practitioners have 
just been 'lucky' with the children they have taught over the years, yet they 
report far fewer than 20%.

I don't understand Eddie's references to phonics being boring, or his distaste 
for 'fundamentalists', when he himself has always supported the use of synthetic 
phonics for the initial teaching of reading (or have I misinterpreted his 
statements in the past?).  The inescapable fact is that there is a body of 
knowledge directly related to the way that the written word is constructed by 
the representation of the sounds which comprise it by a letter or letters, which 
children have to be taught in order to read competently.  And the experience of 
practitioners is that children don't find synthetic phonics boring.  What is 
boring about being able to learn to read very quickly? It enables the high 
fliers to fly higher and most of the rest to access and enjoy all sorts of 
texts.  

The only children I've encountered who are bored by reading are the ones who 
can't read..

Maggie

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