kitchen table math, the sequel: dysteachia

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

dysteachia

Mary Damer posted a link to this video on the DI list, and it's well worth taking the time to watch -- especially the section starting at 3:42.

The lesson: reading is not naming.

Reading is unspelling.







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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great video! I completely agree that teaching reading using the sight word approach is ridiculous and that it tends to induce "reading disabilities."

However, dyslexia is a real neurological condition that cannot be fixed simply by teaching phonics. True dyslexics are dyslexic before they ever encounter reading instruction. Phonics will make reading easier for most of them, but it will not cure them.

Also, once a child has been taught to read with phonics, there is something to be said for sight word *fluency*, that is the ability to read high frequency words quickly and easily. The difference is that the child is helped by his knowledge of phonics.

January 6, 2010 at 8:37 PM
Catherine Johnson said...

Can't remember if I ever posted the NYU study of fluent readers, which found that good readers use 3 kinds of information, which I believe were phonics, syntax (or grammar), and content. I'm writing about this from memory now, so take this with a grain of salt. As I recall, the three kinds of information were 'additive'; if you subtracted one out (which they did via manipulations of the text) the reader couldn't compensate by using the other two more heavily. (I need to check that --- )

I also recall that phonics was the 'strongest' of the 3.

January 7, 2010 at 2:26 PM

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