[senco-forum] back in SencoLand

Hi,
Back in the land of lists and timetables after a short spell in paradise! 
thanks for all the funnies etc.
Just one thing: I always feel a bit ignorant when people start talking about 
different approaches to reading and spelling-in a way, I am still a novice, 
a relatively new SENCo, doing day -to- day SENCo stuff, but I am really 
interested in everything to do with reading and spelling.
Now I learned to read many years ago in a small place in Southern Europe, in 
a classroom with 40-odd kids and a teacher, who never got flustered (she was 
allowed the use of a cane, and indeed any other beating implement she felt 
like using, but she never did). To begin with, she taught us every letter in 
the alphabet. We spent weeks copying the letters in a double-lined exercise 
book; each letter had a little 'tail'. She taught us the sounds that each 
letter made, and the sounds we could get if we put two letters together. She 
taught us some particular combinations that were a bit more unusual. I 
started school aged 7 (like everybody else). My parents and our neighbours 
did not have books at home, because they could not afford them. Four months 
after starting school, I read an article in a piece of newspaper. I remember 
my mother being very pleased.  All the children who went to school with me 
learned to read and write like this. There was a  girl who had a lot of 
problems- I believe she was the first truly dyslexic person that I have ever 
met. I helped her with her homework and our teacher was very patient. She 
did o.k. in the end but i shall never forget her worried look...
Later, when I was in my late teens, I taught some adults to read (they had 
never been to school before).The youngest was 20 something and the oldest 
was 60 . I used the same method and they learned to read and write.
My question is: what do you call this way of teaching people to read? I 
cannot ask my old teacher, she died a while ago. I suppose it is  phonics. 
But can someone explain to me why this sort of thing works in a classroom of 
40, with one teacher with a blackboard and a stick of chalk?

best regards

Luisa

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