Reading Wars | Phonics vs. Whole Word

Educational research sheds new light on the age-old Whole Word vs. Phonics debate.
…
Coke vs. Pepsi | Paper vs. Plastic | Kirk vs. Picard | Team Jacob vs. Team Edward
These are just some of the enduring dichotomies that have defined our age.
And, if you’ve been in education for any length of time, you understand why we can rightly place Phonics vs. Whole Word into this category.
Known as ‘The Reading Wars’, the debate about how best to teach children how to read (whole-language or phonics) has been raging for 30+ years.
In this 'From Theory To Practice' video, I examine an interesting research article that offers some compelling evidence in favor of one side:
Attentional Focus During Learning Impacts N170 ERP Responses to an Artificial Script (Yuliya Yoncheva et al, March 2015)
Here are some of the questions I tackle in this installment:
-- In what manner does the brain process words and symbols differently than visual images … and why does this matter?
-- What does this research reveal about the respective power of phonics versus holistic language/whole words?
-- What are some important takeaways for teachers regarding how they might approach classroom instruction (vis-à-vis reading or otherwise)?
Give it a watch, and let me know what you think in the comments.
And, as always, if you find this video valuable, interesting and/or entertaining, you can support our channel by liking, sharing and subscribing ;)
#TheReadingWars #PhonicsVersusWholeWords #StudentReading
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ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
• Phonics vs. Whole Word
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JARED COONEY HORVATH | PhD, MEd
Dr. Jared Cooney Horvath is an award-winning cognitive neuroscientist, best-selling author and renowned keynote speaker with an expertise in human learning, memory, and brain stimulation.
Dr. Horvath has published 4 books, over 30 research articles, and currently serves as an honorary researcher at the University of Melbourne and St. Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne.
His research has been featured in popular publications including The New York Times, WIRED, BBC, The Economist, PBS's Nova and ABC’s Catalyst.
www.lmeglobal.net/media
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LME GLOBAL
LME Global is a mission-driven company aiming to serve teachers, students and educators through applied brain science.

[@JaredCooney]

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[@lalaland2107]

Why the heck is this debate still going on? I'm 25 years old and years ago I read that as someone who reads a lot gets older, that's when we start to read things as "whole" words. Kids need to learn how to sound out their letters and words, for obvious reasons like learning a new word. I AM FACEPALMING SO HARRRRDDD.

[@raymondkent2237]

It seems so intuitive. The letters were literally made to be built into words, it's how most written languages are constructed. Why would we treat them like pictographs when they completely not meant to be pictographs?

[@annelieseharrison9027]

It's done on purpose. That's the reason why we have so many illiterates nowadays. There's a book called Crimes of the Educators by Samuel Blumenfeld that explains the reasons why the school teaches the whole word method instead of the traditional way (phonics).

[@meganpotente625]

'Whole word' teaching is rampant in schools, but many teachers don't recognize it. For example, extremely popular instructional programs such as Lucy Calkins Units of Study and Fountas and Pinnell LLI teach kids they have lots of strategies for figuring out words (guessing based on context, using picture clues, etc.), instead of focusing on helping kids decode words using phonics and syllable types. Telling kids they have lots of strategies deemphasizes exactly what kids need to focus on (the parts of words) to become proficient at word recognition. These popular programs also rely on excessive memorization of high frequency words when in fact we know that this method does not align with science. So, most teachers wouldn't call themselves 'whole word' teachers, but I would call any method that deemphasizes the code of our language a 'whole word' or 'whole language' approach.

[@JaredCooney]

Interesting - I had not thought of gathering all these different strategies under the 'whole-word' heading, but you're right. In that case, I guess I have come across this before - just not using the term I was expecting!

[@rajaraghu]

We are doing similar conscious raising techniques We are getting exciting results. For me results matter most not what some researchers say.

[@ImNotJoshPotter]

I'm still confused as to what "whole word" even means. Naturally the way you learn a new word is by hearing/reading it in context, right? Or are we exclusively talking about acquiring the ability to read? I can read the word, "licentious," but I really only began to understand it after reading it over time in different material.

[@user-wm1mv7py6w]

I struggled with reading my whole life. I taught myself how to read with whole word. I memorized each word. used closed captioned on tv. Analyzed text around me such as signs. Now I am a special education teacher, trying to teach students how to read. Many can not pick up phonics(this is middle school after many phonics interventions) I am now putting together an individualized curriculum for each student to try whole word. This will become part of my thesis in my master's class. So many learners learn visually. My hope is by the end, whole word will be more accepted for the students who struggle with phonics and are more visual learners. I'll keep you posted on my progress.

[@mingoringo_]

I think that's the best takeaway from this. Different people are better at learning things in different ways.

[@smith-brockphonics6353]

I am surprised you haven't seen words taught as wholes in the schools you have worked in; that is great to hear. Virtually every school I have been in or discussed with parents or teachers have taught a large bank of "sight words," "snap words," "popcorn words," - or whatever term they use - as WHOLES. Once classrooms shift to a phonics program that addresses "irregular" words through a sounds-spellings connection, student improvement across the board (even among the highest skilled) has been stunning. The UK-style synthetic phonics programs tend to be the best at this, but there is a growing number of programs in the U.S. as well.

[@JaredCooney]

Megan made a good point above - I reckon I have seen these, I just didn't classify them as 'whole-word' reading. Thinking now about it, of course it's whole-word! I simply didn't make the transfer of the term x-/ You're right - in the end, it looks like phonics and decoding is how we move from novice to expert with this particular skill.

[@DecodingDyslexiaMD]

Thank you for putting this study in plain language. In our thousands of parent and teacher experiences, whole word or balanced literacy is in every school district in Maryland. Our teacher preparation universities make it inevitable. One of the reasons cited for this injustice: “K-12 districts teach reading using Fountas & Pinnell, Reading Recovery, leveled readers, Benchmark Assessment System (BAS), Running Records - so we [teacher prep] must incorporate how to use these programs, curricula and assessments in our coursework.” Parents keep working to bring the science to light, but it’s a long haul. Thanks for providing another tool to explain this reality that negatively impacts students.

[@antoniopatricio8760]

Here in Brazil we learn how to read in English through whole language but it is unconsciously. In the final years of high school, many students hesitate when asked to read because they don't feel confident enough when they see longer sentences or many new words at once.

[@MommyBee1589]

I adored this video thank you SO much! I’m a homeschooling mom using phonemic awareness because as a former ESL teacher that’s how I was taught. The focus on decoding in my mind made more sense than sight word memorization. I’m teaching my four year old to read, and she’s doing an amazing job- But I stumbled upon this debate and decided to click because as a child I remember learning to read sight words- thankfully I never really struggled bc I loved reading and was highly motivated to understand new words. I can totally see how what you’re saying could manifest in zero ability to learn to read new words without someone telling you what the word is/was. Thanks for this interesting video- just from your energy I can tell you’re an amazing teacher!

[@pj_mass]

1st year primary education student here, this video really clarified some stuff for me. Thank you!

[@dekthaiklaibaan]

This is such a useful video. You explaining the research like it's a bedtime story! Thank you so much!

[@krisbscott]

Love the mountain/graph analogy. Thank you for compiling this compelling video. Knowing how the brain processes print should make all the difference to teachers when it comes to informing their instruction.

[@brainwiselearningaustralia]

Thank you for breaking this down Jared. I help children and adults to read better and your work has confirmed what I thought.

[@fionawalker824]

Hey, Jared!! Great series of videos (of course!). Nicely explained. Love your work!

[@eleanorjaneboyce9470]

Great to know that where we focus our attention, as teachers, matters. Get the letter-sound knowledge embedded with quality teaching, and a person has the opportunity to become good reader.

[@SpiraSpiraSpira]

Eventually a child taught whole word method either has to be taught phonics too, or if they reach a critical mass of “sight words” they essentially teach themselves phonics. It goes much faster, quicker and better if you just teach them phonics from the beginning. Trying to teach English like it is an ideographic language is not playing to its strengths.

[@tankatim13]

I grow up in whole language school. My pronunciation is still bad and new words require me to use google. Using google pronunciation I learn how to speak new words. Lord of the rings and fantasy novels are a nightmare for me if they us weird words. My wife is from China who learnt phonics completely. She can perfectly breakdown and restructure words and pronunciation still great.

[@sarahricefox9042]

Where did you grow up? What was the name of the school? How do you know it was a "whole language school?" Why is your pronunciation "bad?" Did you not speak English when you started to learn to read? How old are you now? I'm trying to evaluate your comment. Thank you.

[@user-ft3qb3uh8s]

Wow! What a fantastic breakdown of this study! And so applicable to the classroom as teachers!

[@talkinchalk]

Great video! This is something I will definitely be saving to share with my teachers as we move forward 🍎

[@Tab985]

Thank you so much for this informative analysis. I learn more by listening than reading!!

[@thebookwasbetter3650]

Good video. I'm hear because I read an article saying that the southern states are making strides in reading in education. They attribute this to switching back to phonics learning. Not sure which is better still but if it works, good for them!

[@borgfishlures]

That is kick ass! I’m using it with staff asap

[@cherylmoreau924]

To those who propose English is best learned by "whole word" or memorization or the many terms this goes by: I learned to read before I went to school by listening to the words read to me and memorizing them. I could certainly recognize them in other contexts but unless I had clues (I think they are often called "cues") like a picture or someone reading it to me I could not learn new words. When I went to first grade at my Catholic school, they had all the letters, sounds, dipthongs, different sounds of the vowels arrayed around the room above the blackboard. They taught reading by phonetical methods and these letters/sound combination were like a secret decoder ring - I could now figure out words I haven't memorized. I was 6-7 years old and could read cookbooks, the newspaper, and adult books and the Children's Book of Knowledge which we had at home. I even figured out how to use the index. So. Phonics all the way.

[@SeamusCurtainMagee]

Awesome video Jared, great summary of the debate, and really interesting research. I'm curious to know if there is there research in this in relation to logographic languages like Chinese that you're aware of? I haven't touched the language since high school myself, but I remember really struggling when trying to learn characters.

[@JaredCooney]

Hey Seamus - yep yep! Same thing occurs with logographic languages. At the start and in isolation, logographic characters can be processed bilaterally, but once characters are strung together, things shift to the left - a wonderful sign that decoding is required and occurring. Here's my favorite paper on the subject: www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/jocn.2008.20125

[@luminyam6145]

Thank you so much, that made things so clear.

[@Gandoff2000]

Thank you for this video. IMHO, teaching reading without teaching phonics is like teaching math without teaching the meaning of numbers. The mathematically bright kids will eventually figure out what a "3" or a "4" represent but most would think math is only for geniuses. My experience is this: in the first grade they tried to teach me the "whole" word reading method without telling my parents what they were doing. As my parents helped me with my home work and I encountered a new word they would say "sound it out" . I had NO IDEA what they were talking about. I struggled through the first three grades until finally in the third grade the school put me and about 10 other students into a class where a sweet lady (I love this lady for what she did) taught us phonics. Within months I was reading better than ever before. Reading finally made sense! I thought to myself "how did I miss this when they taught it, I must just be a stupid person". My ability to spell large words amazed my teacher after that. As an adult, I have read some of the same words over and over for years as most people have and now I read whole words maybe even whole sentences at times because I no longer have to decode a word with which I am familiar. (at least it feels that way). I am a bit angry that the school did not inform my parents of the experimental teaching method to which they were subjecting me. If that wasn't enough, they did the same thing with math. Once again, I was not getting what I needed from the teacher standing in front of the room. I told my parents about my problem. My dad said happily "No problem, I am really good at math! I can help you!" But when he quickly showed me how to solve the problem, I told him "that makes sense but if I do it that way the teacher will mark it incorrect because it isn't the way she showed us (a method that did not make sense to me). As his smile disappeared, my dad sadly replied "Then I cannot help you". We could NOT afford a tutor. Teachers will say "Parents aren't involved enough" and yet they keep turning students into lab rats without notifying the parents. The high School and "Jr high schools" that I attended were excellent. I suppose that is why I was able to finally do well in IT and have a rewarding career. Teachers, please stick with "tried and true" methods. As a teacher, you have a chance to effect those children for the rest of their lives. Kids are not lab rats.

[@reneyapp8806]

I have been teaching reading for more than 30 years. As a teacher, I used an eclectic approach. Some lessons were about breaking down the words, others were about recognizing words as a whole. I believe there should be no wars but teachers need to teach both systems. Phonics is a base for the first few reading encounters. But I hated just to stick with phonics as some kids could process so much faster than sounding out words. You do not need to know a multitude of phonemes to read, but you do need a base of phonemes. Also, many of the words in English do not follow the phonics rules and so you just need to see them as a whole. I'd like to see some research about mature readers. Where do their brains light up? I suspect that for many of them they have moved from the recognition of the sounds into a more holistic approach. In later grades we focus on even more strategies for decoding words, using the meaning, syntax and visual as per Kenneth Goodman. So layered over the basic ways to recognize words there is a logical approach that mature readers use to make meaning.

[@starladixen495]

Actually most English words do follow rules, we as teachers weren't taught them. For example no English word will end in a v thus the e was added. There at the end of house, mouse, moose establishes that tgose words AREN'T plural (hous, mouse, moos). Even the word said while supposedly must be mrmorized, ai has a 2nd sound /short e/ like in against, again. Phonics may start the ball rolling but morpholgy and word origins continue the need for reading and comprehension skills.

[@mrspratt3549]

It's called orthographic mapping. Expert readers have successfully mapped tens of thousands of words into their brains through linking the letters to sounds in their brains. The brain can scan the whole sequence of letters in a word at once and recognise it instantly. Good readers have just become so quick at this process that it only takes between 1-4 sightings of the word until it is permanently stored for instant retrieval. It appears effortless, so it looks like they are reading the word as a whole, but really, they are not. Look up the work of Stanislas Dehaene, he studies the brain and actually scans the brain during reading to study what exactly is going on. Our decisions should not be based on our observations, but instead, actual scientific research.

[@smith-brockphonics6353]

Your statements may sound logical, but recent research has shown that even so-called irregular words are best learned through a sounds-to-spellings connection. Otherwise, orthographic mapping doesn't occur. See David Kilpatrick's work or Mark Seidenberg's recent book. There is also, Sarah McGeown's research, which she writes about here: drsarahmcgeown.blogspot.com/2014/08/synthetic-phonics-and-irregular-word.html. If the phonics programs a teacher is using treats tricky words as words to be memorized as wholes, then it's time for the teacher to find a better program. U.K. synthetic phonics programs tend to be quite brilliant at this. Schools I work with that have shifted their phonics teaching to a program that includes teaching the connections between letters and sounds in "irregular" words have vastly improved their students' reading outcomes. And quite a few teachers who have taught for 15, 20, 30 years have stated they have never had such excellent outcomes for their students, in both reading and writing. It's worth taking a look.

[@JaredCooney]

Hey Rene - good question! With mature/expert readers, the brain always left lateralizes! So far as we can tell, it never shifts back to the right - it always remains a process of decoding and re-building (they simply move faster than novice readers). Interestingly - this is true for both alphabetic and logographic scripts - so, expertise appears to rely on the mechanisms of 'phonics'.

[@Lilylollylilylolly]

@@starladixen495 Perhaps retard your zeal for your second rule. Moose is, of course, very much a plural, as is grouse A quick look shows some dictionaries have recently added 'grouses' as an alternative: are these faulty rules to blame?

[@Mini_merachie]

This is another example of a test created to promote a predetermined point of view. I work in a private school that specialises in helping midle school kids who have strugled in public school. Because of our location we draw from two school districts. Both ditricts use whole Word but one uses phonics first and whole word as an advanced technique. Teaching kids to read using whole word can be like teaching them to drink by setting them infront of an open fire hidrent. A lot of the students from the district that does not use phonetics cant read at all. This is born out by my personal experience of helping their kids and by the test scores they receive.

[@liseyquese]

Loved this thanks for sharing

[@pamelagodswill4384]

Excellent, thank you!

[@joelsnowden2765]

Thanks for sharing Jared. Can you suggest any further digestible research on 'decodable' texts in schools?

[@matthewrutan1679]

Great video! I'm aware of the definitive pros for phonics with decoding individual new words more accurately than the "guessing" side. However, I am having trouble finding research articles that look at reading comprehension scores when comparing phonics to whole language. I feel that comprehension is the end goal for reading, and I would like to hear more support for phonics at the level beyond single word decoding if anyone knows of any good ones please! Keep up the good work 👊

[@JaredCooney]

Hey Matthew - take a look at the second video in that series: reading comprehension comes AFTER decoding, so by the time we are able to test comprehension scores, kids have already learned how to read - that's why there's a dearth of research there! Hope this helps.

[@matthewrutan1679]

@@JaredCooney Thank you very much!

[@JaredCooney]

Hi all. My new book '10 Things Schools Get Wrong' is now available. David Bott (my co-author) and I are hosting 3 free 'book launch' webinars starting Feb 17th. The first one will deal with Digital and Distance Learning. You can register at lme.global/webinars. I hope you can join us ... they will be a lot of fun!

[@modernbaby9497]

Great video. My child learned hundreds 'sight words' in 1st grade and got through them ... but in all honesty we practiced phonics at home, and I think she ultimately used a phonetic approach to really embed the words. She's in second grade now and just knocked out a Harry Potter book!

[@JaredCooney]

@@modernbaby9497 So the school did do sight words! That's interesting - I've never seen it in person. I love that you kept working with her at home to dig deeper and phonic-ise reading. LOL - did she love Harry Potter as much as my nieces?

[@terenaholdawayclarke2857]

About 50 years ago, my mother taught me how to read (as a 2 or 3 year old) using the "Teach your baby how to read" approach, which uses sight words written on large cards (no phonics). I did the same with my own children some 30 years later. This was just an introduction into reading for the very young, and was fun learning. I remember really enjoying it as a very young child. Then we moved to a more phonics based approach with simple reading books that we read together. All 3 of my children learned to read this way with no problems.

[@terenaholdawayclarke2857]

A Hong-Kong born friend of mine who learned to read Chinese as her first language immigrated to Australia and had immense difficulty helping her children learn to read English until we introduced her to the idea of phonics. She had learned English and Chinese using just the whole-word approach. When I moved to China and started studying Chinese I found it helpful to "decode" the characters as much as I could. Even though the characters are mostly pictographic and concern meaning rather than sound, there is sometimes sound information in a character too.

[@JaredCooney]

@@terenaholdawayclarke2857 I love it - maybe that's the trick: sight word reading helps introduce young kids to the ideas and flavor of text, then (once they're comfortable), that's when deeper decoding and phonics comes into play? Good thought!

[@shashilamba]

I agree with the group which supports teaching with the help of sounds

[@SmartJandira]

Hi from Brazil. I would like to hear your vision on Constructivism approach (Ferrero )

[@nathanhutchison861]

That was really good !

[@SuperBoopeep]

I believe I was taught whole word reading. I’m constantly guessing, and I’m unable to sound out new words. So, I will teach my children how to reach phonetically. The whole word method is unhelpful when it comes to new words in print.... if taught phonetically a new word can be learned from print to speech. While in the whole word method the word has to be familiar in order to guess. “How do you say that?” Is something a whole word taught person says, like me constantly.

[@staceyspilsbury3136]

Hi Jared, I loved your video, thank you. I have been in a giant reading war with my little boys school. It has been very traumatic actually. We live in South Africa and in a small farming community, this physical school is our only option other than online or me homeschooling my boys. Our school does whole word recognition with a touch of basic phonics. My eldest learnt to read, semi well with this method but my second born has struggled so badly. I took him to a reading specialist, in the middle of his Grade 2 and he couldn't read. He had memorized his school reading books but give him something new he didn't know anything and just guessed. So sad. He has now learnt to read with the science of reading/ structured literacy approach. Thank goodness. His spelling is still very problematic. It's thanks to lovely videos like yours that have taught me and guided me into the best methods. Please continue giving your wonderful advice and knowledge. Our school sadly will not change their reading program as they believe it is the best. Hopefully, in time the will.

[@staceyspilsbury3136]

You are so right. We have been experiencing the 'Reading wars' with our school, they do whole word recognition, it is so sad. I have taught my boys phonetically but it's been hard as they are older.

[@michaels3579]

Great video!

[@navneetkalia]

What if we were to use "contextually relevant" whole words or sight words and introduced phonetically? Will this approach be more effective?

[@josephcope7637]

I remember a magazine article published years ago promoting the "whole word" approach. Parents were shown sticking all over their home index cards with the names of various objects. It was like teaching Chinese. In practice two problems quickly emerged. When their kids encountered words they hadn't seen before, they were lost. Also, it's rather difficult to stick an index card on a concept ... like "love."

[@darinschmidt7689]

Curious if this somehow applies to character-based languages.

[@LaurenFrancesHair]

What do you do with young children who love leaning words but are too young for phonics? Deprive them from learning our written language?

[@JaredCooney]

Nope!

[@theresag8214]

This was a great discussion. My whole dissertation was your seven-minute video. At the school I just left, the teacher across the hall refuses to use anything but whole language instruction with her special education students. I did everything I could to get her to stop. Edmark needs to stop publishing its products and stop marketing its products to our special needs population. can you share the research paper, I am presenting at a conference in December and would like to reference this paper. Dr. Garcia

[@06071960able]

Phonetics should be thought extensively in the early ages at school.

[@p.v.5142]

Taught?

[@06071960able]

@@p.v.5142 thanks.

[@paopaupow]

I’m convinced google was made for word method learners like me who started kinder in 1990 and has trouble spelling in English. I took German in high school and was thought with phonics and I might not understand everything I read in German but I can read and spell better in German than English I think... 🤷🏻‍♀️

[@taherehsadeghizadeh4907]

sorry I have question is decoding the same as phonics?

[@valeriebuys7472]

yes

[@functionatthejunction]

Phonics used to be the standard back in the 80s. When did this igornant notion of "whole words" and "context" sneak in?

[@8808shasta]

Suggestion think medium on top of message. Or graphing on top of phoneme. Or two slices of bread in a sandwich. Change the reading word slice to the pronunciation word slice. In essence pronouncing the words in a sentence then comprehending the meaning of the word. Later the two components will merge into one. Finally don't call it reading call it pronunciation.

[@CharlotteMasonTT]

So what do they do in China or Japan?

[@JaredCooney]

Same thing! Watch the follow-up video, we look at that!

[@SkepticalTeacher]

They break it down. Chinese characters have different components that mean different things, so they start off with simple characters like shui (water 水 and then teach you characters that incorporate that basic word as a radical; the radical is on the left hand side and gives you clues about meaning and pronunciation, for example:(海 sea，酒 alcohol... other words to do with liquids often start with this radical). Also, for example, the radical meaning person which is present in these characters: （he 他 , you你 , they 他); female radical: （she 她, mum 妈).

[@acr08807]

Forget whole words. We should teach kids how to read entire sentences at a glance.

[@myhandle1234]

The funny thing is that the new letters looked vaguely like a cat. So it was easy to remember those symbols as meaning "cat".

[@JaredCooney]

You nailed it! With 'whole-word' reading, people find work-arounds so they can identify and remember words later - exactly as you've done here! The problem is, when we change the font, or the style of the text, then these work-around fail. This is the biggest difference between 'sham' and 'real' reading: only when letter structures are established can reading transfer beyond the initially memorized word-form. Very cool!

[@LaurenFrancesHair]

My question is what about the kids who learn as babies. As with the doman method? There are too many case studies of parents who taught this decades ago with very literate children who say their children read far above their grade levels in school and who went on to do well academically. What is the harm of teaching babies whole word at a time when they have spongelike memory and actaully enjoy it.? Why not give them the opportunity to understand books at a young age before they can learn phonics. Why not develp a love of reading before they can learn phonics? Also if they learn as babies they will have had much more time with whole word before entering kindergarden. Given more time with whole word, can't they intuit many of the the laws of phonics as Doman suggests? They certainly do this with language. Doman uses the example of how a child calls a mailman a mailer. He isnt correct but that is because english is irregular. He has learned that a person who fights fire is a firefighter, etc and experiments with the same pattern. Would love your thoughts on this. Also one of the advantages in my opinion of teaching words as babies, is they enjoy having words taught to them that are according to their own interests. They get a huge pay off and it is fun. I just wonder what the harm in teaching whole word as babies and around 2.5 year old introducting phonics so they can decode new words on their own?

[@JaredCooney]

No harm at all!

[@LaurenFrancesHair]

@@JaredCooney oh ok thanks for the response. I may have conflated your views with other phonics advocates who attribute harm. But on your views it wouldn’t be harmful but pointless? I just wonder if this study was done on babies. Because right brain proponents would say that children have an ability and desire to take in and store large amounts of information. They are primarily using their right brain for this in the first few years of life. And the left brain starts to develop more rapidly after this which to me would explain why older people likely in this study have trouble processing words in the same way. Would love your thoughts on that!

[@JaredCooney]

@@LaurenFrancesHair The ability for young children to recognize words is called sham reading: it's typically a solid start as it introduces children to text and gets them interested in the concept. Sham reading ca facilitate the development of true reading - which is why it's not a problem. But, the whole word reading of babies is not synonymous with what we would call 'decoding ability' required for adult reading.

[@thebookwasbetter3650]

Lol - The Hitler tea pot at 1:46

[@calincucuietu8220]

This a very simplistic approach. What phonics (you might say phony) teachers don't say is that kids have to learn by heart lo, low, cow, heart, read, etc Their phonics don't apply in n cases (vs. phases). So, a lot (and when I say a lot I do mean a lot) boils down to sheer memorization. This is English. The way out is a balanced approach 1. Letters by heart 2. Phonics 3. Lots ff words by heart 4. Phonics. 5. A whole lot of words by heart As an esl reader I tell you the pure phonics approach is a huuuuuge waste of time. A more balanced approach is 1000 times preferable to the pure phonics method.

[@deboraholsen2504]

A word is not a picture! Our language is not based on logographics! Also, the Reading Wars have been going on for much longer than 30 years!!

[@csml4519]

I am dyslexic so thanks. i can't 😅

[@JCMcGee]

Interesting... But it raises a few questions. Isn't the phoneme method just the whole word method on a smaller scale? And where do you stop... Why not go to morphemes? Then there's the fact that English doesn't have a phonetic alphabet... Don't we perhaps begin by using the phoneme method and advance to the whole word method...isn't that what skimming and scanning are all about? Does an "advanced" reader not predict the words coming up... Do they ever sound them out? I watched Vietnamese children learn to read... Phonetically, breaking words down into phonemes... They learned increadibly quickly... And after learning the phonemes, could read and pronounce any word correctly, even without knowing its meaning. Does reading even require phonemes? How do deaf folk learn to read? And how does it vary from L1 to L2 aquisition... I can gain an understanding from vietnamese text without being able to correctly pronounce anything!

[@smith-brockphonics6353]

Jimmy, 1. No, the phoneme method is not just whole word on a smaller scale. Stanislas Dehaene's Reading in the Brain and Mark Seidenberg's recent book help explain how these two approaches are quite different and tend to lead to different outcomes. 2. Yes, absolutely, instruction needs to include morphemes, more and more as the student's decoding grows more automatic. Some early ones: -s/-es, -ing, -ed and onwards to sign/signature and through Latin and Greek roots and affixes, etc. 3. No, although it may seem logical that advanced readers are predicting upcoming words, reading scientists have determined that people are not actually very adept at predicting upcoming words, especially with the complex texts that advanced readers read. Skilled readers can read words equally well completely out of context as in context. It is unskilled decoders who tend to use context to try to help with word identification; it seems to work ok when reading beginning reader books, but much less well as the texts become more challenging. 4. Seems to me your example of Vietnamese children ties is well to the point made in Jared Cooney's video. Learning the meaning of words comes with oral language development and ultimately, for skilled readers, through reading itself. 5. Students who are hard-of-hearing have a more difficult time learning to read that those with no hearing problems. And keep in mind, people CAN learn to memorize words as wholes, but not anywhere near as many as there are in the English language. Also: Word memorizers tend to confuse words that look similar (see Bruce McCandiss's research). 6. Not sure that your gaining an understanding from Vietnamese text is an L1 vs L2 issue. "Gaining an understanding": I am curious what kind of accuracy you have if reading the text aloud? Do you feel you have memorized a bank of words as wholes (perhaps several thousand)? Would you like to be able to read the Vietnamese so that you can produce words that are phonetically plausible and close to the actual pronunciation? I am guessing yes. Learning about how people learn to read and spell foreign languages tends to raise very interesting questions, such as: Why is it so easy for kids in Finland to learn to read? (It has a transparent spelling system). : )

[@DLehrke]

"caughten on"???

[@ChibiSteak]

6:50 fin.

[@northshorelight35]

I've been listening to Science of Reading and actually, NOBODY READS THE WHOLE WORD. Strong readers are actually sounding out each letter but their brain works so fast due to being phonetically aware that it appears they're reading the whole word. STICK TO PHONICS. I'm a really strong reader. So strong that I pick up reading and writing quick when I'm learning a foreign language. I see and hear the letters in my head, but it's at speed lightning. I also taught a tonal foreign language and phonics is key. In the past they were taught sight words and therefore could not read. They were basically just memorizing words. But with phonics they were able to read new word they hadn't seen. Plus, these students were learning a new language in which they had to know the sounds and tones. Therefore, phonics was the way to go. If sight words were so great than we wouldn't have this illiterate crisis that has been going on for the past 10-15 years.

[@JaredCooney]

@@northshorelight35 I agree with the thrust, but important to be accurate: skilled readers can amd do read whole words. With the dual process reading system, only lengthy, strangely spelled, or infrequent words need sounded out. Frequent words like 'the' 'or' 'but' etc. can be read completely amd immediately. BUT - you need to earn this fluency: you can't jump right to it!

[@rajaraghu]

Quite Misleading video. When you are talking about Reading. Then it has to be Reading comprehension as a goal. Your Reading strategy changes according with the purpose. But the whole video giving an idea that word identification as a main goal, not even mentioning comprehension once. Ll check with second video before giving more comments.

[@JaredCooney]

You can not comprehend text without first decoding it. This is why perfectly fluent speakers can remain illiterate: they have knowledge of the language, but can't decode text in order to bring that knowledge to bear.

[@brianrobinson2472]

If decoding is necessary, how do whole word practitioners learn to decode?

[@cherylmoreau924]

Reading comprehension depends upon you being to read all the words, not just the ones you memorized by sight.

[@theresag8214]

If you know the bottom-up theory of reading, you know that you have to learn to decode first, then you move to reading comprehension.@@JaredCooney

[@oliverford5367]

Phonics has never made sense to me, because English just isn't a phonetic language (unlike say Spanish). You learn as many words wrong as you do right. Just consider how many words in this sentence are not phonetic, so you unfortunately just have to learn the whole word.

[@JaredCooney]

Different languages have different opacity: Italian is incredibly transparent, English isn't. Although it follows there is more rules to learning English reading, it does not follow that we do not begin with base phonics: an estimated 80% of English is standard phonics (compared to 100% Italian). This is why incidence of dyslexia is much lower in Italian - but it does not eliminate the larger concept.

[@fraslex]

words are images more than phonetic codes. Look at Chinese which is only images. English is similar.

[@JaredCooney]

Watch the follow-up video: logographic scripts are not similar to alphabetic scripts except that both are decoded phonetically rather than pictorially. I love your thinking, but don;t stop with an idea - dig deeper to see if your idea holds water or needs revision.

[@longdongmc.johnson]

with whole word reading you might aswell just replace words with emojis and be done with it

[@sunrevolver]

Yes, phonics are great at reading. Now, ask them to spell

[@cherylmoreau924]

And whole word memorization helps them to spell? Not really. Spelling is memorization and practice, aided by comprehension which is aided by understanding ALL the words you encounter, not just the few you have memorized.

[@sunrevolver]

@@cherylmoreau924 Exactly!

[@Clothmom1]

Great video!