[SENco-forum] Re: How many rules?

That there is order (of sorts) in the English language with regard to
spelling and its history is not under debate.  Medical and IQ factors aside
the thing that is a bar to spelling well is whether one can 'absorb' the
'rules' unconsciously. Those who cannot learn to absorb spongelike on their
own the things we sponges take for granted -social rules, reading between
the lines, ability to emote correctly, make oneself understood or grasp
later language skills such as reading with meaning, spelling and using
writing to represent all the earlier conversational skills are those deemed
to have special educational needs.

  The ones that have persistent problems in learning to spell/read despite
normal teaching are deemed to be those with dyslexia.  Even if taught in a
way that suited each one so that they could access spelling and reading the
dyslexia remains and may hamper other areas of life, so it is unlikely that
children are 'accidentally' labelled with dyslexia and therefore I cannot
agree with statement that 'We have the biggest number of so called
dyslexics mainly because reading has been badly taught for at least the last
100 years.' I would argue that for 100 years many pupils with Dyslexia or
other SEN have been badly served with regard to reading, as it makes no
difference to around 75% of the students what silly reading fad is in place.

A recent study in the US showed that a mix of methods was the best path for
most students when learning to read and also acknowledged that some
preferred either whole word or phonic learning.  So as the % of us who can
read has barely changed over many year it seems that the majority of
children learn to read with little difficulty regardless of what teachers
teach.

Phonics is a good early strategy for most, as is learning those irregular
'whole' words on flashcards or in contextual sentences. One does not exist
without the other. Most children grasp the principle of magic 'e' with
little effort so the teaching of it serves only to highlight those that
cannot.  The question is not whether to bother to teach the rule, but how
the teacher can better teach it so that all can understand it.

 Now with proper support(including learning historical roots or applying
likely percentages to 'correctness') my daughter now has a range of
strategies that help her select the right word from a spellchecker choice of
5, but she cannot be sure, unless she hears the word read aloud that she has
made the right choice.  Likewise she knows exactly where to use punctuation,
but doesn't, can morph words in a set exercise, but still uses incorrect
tenses in aural or written work even though she is 15 with a 141 IQ. Her
dyslexia remains despite the best teaching and a myriad of routes into
reading.

The mystery lies in why some children have the ability to absorb grammar (or
punctuation usage) unconsciously that is it mystery.  Of course a child
bought up in a language rich environment is going to do this earlier and
better than one that is not, but true dyslexia is any child who even when
given every opportunity and ALL routes into reading/spelling is still not
doing it 'automatically' or without a huge strategy support system.

Sharon Tringham

PS Any chance the PC ones can change 'compensated dyslexic' to something
better.  How about Education System Survivor or is this still too negative?

[mailto:senco-forum-bounces at lists.becta.org.uk]On Behalf Of Philip
MacMillan
Sent: 04 September 2007 21:17
To: Amanda; Phil; senco-forum at lists.becta.org.uk
Subject: Re: [senco-forum] Re: How many rules?

Oiech spells week, not really, the /w/ in one, once is a one off.  In no
other word can you find the o representing the /w/ sound.  ch is never hard
/k/ at the end of a word, it needs an e or other letters to follow it eg
Michael and usually indicates a Greek derivation,  ie for /ee/ sure and
there are many examples.  Its all a bit like the trick the whole language
freaks used to pull on ghoti =  fish.  gh only says   /f/ at the end of a
word never at the beginning, o - /i/ as in women is a one off  and ti will
never say /sh/ at the end of a word but only if it is the last but one
letter pair.  It is  left over from the Norman French.   Our language is
logically ordered.  Take a look at Diane McGuiness' work and then look at
Crystal and Coulmas.  Good sources of information on how it all works.  It
is a fascinating story.

Taking into account the historical roots, changes of pronunciation (in the
olden days we used to pronounce the /k/ in knock, knuckle but changed the
pronuncation and now do not say the /k/ but retained the spelling) and
propensity to absorb words from other languages eg. ketchup  = catsup =
catsiup  cantonese for fish sauce,  our spelling system is very orderly but
it does need to be learned.   We have the biggest number of so called
dyslexics mainly because reading has been badly taught for at least the last
100 years.   It si all down to some research in the late 1800s that showed
that we could recognize words as fast as we could single letters and
therefore the paying attention to the letter content was uneccessary
(Cattell)  and then we had look say, basal reading schemes, real books,
whole language, readiing recovery and all the rest of the badly thought out
approaches all from research that  was ecologically invalid and was
recognized as such almost immediately, but it still went on to determine
reading curricula.  Bandwagons!   The problem with education is that it
seems to prefer research that is qualitative or based on questionnaires,
observation etc. and not on empirical causal enquiry.  And before everyone
starts screaming about reading recovery take a look at Center et al and
Shanahan & Barr.  If you want more references on this I can supply them.
That the situation is not changing can be found in the fact that despite the
Rose Report Reading Recovery is going to be re introduced to 10 LEAs.   The
empirical research says clearly that the effects do not last so why is more
taxpayer's money being spent on it?

Philip EP

Center, Y., Wheldall, K. & McNaught, M. (1995) "An Evaluation of Reading
recovery". Reading Research Quarterly, 30, p. 240-263.

Coulmas. Florian (1989). "The Writing Systems of the World",  Basil
Blackwell Ltd. Oxford, England  1989.

Crystal, D. (1987) " the Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the English Language".
Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

McGuiness, D. (1997) "Why Our Children Can't Read: and what we can do about
it". New York. The Free Press.

Shanahan, T. & Barr, R. (1995) "Reading recovery: An independent evaluation
of the effects of an early instructional intervention for at risk learners".
Reading Research Quarterly, 30,  p. 958-996.

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