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Thread: N.Y. Times FINALLY Exposes the Cause of Mass Illiteracy

  1. #1

    N.Y. Times FINALLY Exposes the Cause of Mass Illiteracy

    It may be a century late to the party, but the Grey Lady has finally gotten around to exposing the most destructive quackery in American history — the “whole language” method used to “teach reading” (or not) that is used in government schools all over America; a scam so destructive that it has some half of Americans almost functionally illiterate, according to the government's own tests. In a New York Times opinion column headlined “Why Are We Still Teaching Reading the Wrong Way?,” researcher Emily Hanford points out that “teacher preparation programs continue to ignore the sound science behind how people become readers.” “It’s a problem that has been hiding in plain sight for decades,” she added, without acknowledging that experts such as Rudolf Flesch of Why Johnny Can't Read fame and Dr. Samuel Blumenfeld with The New Illiterates were blowing the whistle on this for many decades. In fact, Boston's school masters rebelled against this quackery in the 1840s with a devastating critique.
    And yet, it continues to wreak havoc today. The statistics are almost too outlandish to be believed, but they come from the very governments that have every incentive to try to cover up the problem. Citing the government's National Assessment of Educational Progress, the Times piece points out that less than four in 10 fourth graders are considered even “proficient” in reading. One third of children, she said, cannot read even at a “basic level” — said another way, they cannot read at all.

    More at: https://freedomproject.com/the-newma...ass-illiteracy
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  3. #2
    Meh, you need both. sight words and phonics. still the best way to teach kids to read is to actually read with them... surprise, surprise.
    But what do I know, I just came back from my parent/teacher conference where they informed me that my kid was reading 3 grades beyond his level. when they mentioned the same about his spelling, I said, "well we taught him phonics...." which we did partly because my wife believed in it and that's what they taught at her catholic elementary school.

  4. #3
    Quote Originally Posted by specsaregood View Post
    Meh, you need both. sight words and phonics. still the best way to teach kids to read is to actually read with them... surprise, surprise.
    But what do I know, I just came back from my parent/teacher conference where they informed me that my kid was reading 3 grades beyond his level. when they mentioned the same about his spelling, I said, "well we taught him phonics...." which we did partly because my wife believed in it and that's what they taught at her catholic elementary school.
    Phonics is the foundation and whole word reading allows you to read faster, the brain should develop whole word reading on its own to some extent as you become familiar with words but trying to start with it is crippling.
    Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

    Robert Heinlein

    Give a man an inch and right away he thinks he's a ruler

    Groucho Marx

    I love mankind…it’s people I can’t stand.

    Linus, from the Peanuts comic

    You cannot have liberty without morality and morality without faith

    Alexis de Torqueville

    Those who fail to learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.
    Those who learn from the past are condemned to watch everybody else repeat it

    A Zero Hedge comment

  5. #4
    Why would they want children to be able to read? After all they might accidentally pick up an Anatomy book and find out that they are not the "gender" they thought they were. We don't want to confuse them.

  6. #5
    There may be some advantage to emphasizing one or the other method, for certain students, but this isn't the fundamental issue.

    The differences between the methods can't explain the huge variation in ability among students taught under the same method.

    The main problem (other than innate lack of ability) is lack of practice.

    Students (and adults) simply don't read enough, nevermind the method.

  7. #6
    As I am oft to quip, words are important. Remove effective language skills and you are left with what are effectively brooding Moorlocks. Behold, the Land of the Moorlock.
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    There is only one correct way: freedom. All other solutions are non-solutions.

    It appears that artificial intelligence is at least slightly superior to natural stupidity.

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    Convincing the world he didn't exist was the Devil's second greatest trick; the first was convincing us that God didn't exist.

  8. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    There may be some advantage to emphasizing one or the other method, for certain students, but this isn't the fundamental issue.

    The differences between the methods can't explain the huge variation in ability among students taught under the same method.

    The main problem (other than innate lack of ability) is lack of practice.

    Students (and adults) simply don't read enough, nevermind the method.
    I agree.

    I think this article is conflating literacy (or lack of complete literacy) at different grade levels, so the NYT article's conclusion isn't as clear as the article suggests. The article mentions 4th graders, who are obviously quite different than 1st graders. At some point (and it might be a different point for each child), the phonics method gives way to the whole reading method naturally. And if the issue is a substantial portion of 4th graders not being at the basic reading level for their age, I think it could be either a lack of foundation (phonics) OR a lack of practice. And probably both.

    But phonics is just the foundation. I imagine that by 4th grade we should be well past that for most kids. Still, a 4th grader who has the phonics down but who doesn't practice reading regularly is likely going to be a troubled reader. You simply don't read fluidly from learning phonics - at some point context and the visual system take over.


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