Teaching kids how to sound out words is a pretty obvious thing to do. But, conservative education reform currently champions phonics to the exclusion of any other teaching methods. The new state of phonics education is anything but obvious.
The emphasis is on “decodable texts”. These are sets of words that a kid has already spent hours repeating the basic sounds of. These words are rarely placed in a narrative setting. Sometimes they aren’t even actual words- just collections of sounds. No sounds that a kid hasn’t already been drilled on are allowed. This makes it next to impossible to use actual books in the curriculum. Instead kids endlessly repeat disembodied sets of sounds.
An individual teacher has no ability to adjust their teaching style to their students. The stifling curriculum is forced on them by the politicians (notice they aren’t educators) who created them. Everything from the “books” they use to what words they allow their children to ask questions about (remember…talking about words that you haven’t drilled on isn’t allowed) is laid out. These teachers spent years in college to learn how to pass out Xeroxed copies of handouts from the reading plan George W Bush devised
Writing is not introduced in any meaningful way until later grades. A kid can go through all of first grade without ever writing a word in any sort of context.
This is absurd. First off, phonics are not the foundation of reading. They are useful, for sure. But good readers do not sound out words individually in their heads as they read. I know someone that is stuck doing that- she has to mentally voice every word- and it reduces her reading speed significantly. How often have you seen a word for years, only to realize it’s pronounced some completely different way? It happens all the time. Reading is not a sound related skill. It bypasses spoken language. There are writing systems out there that don’t have anything to do with the spoken language. While it is helpful to be able to sound out unfamiliar words, endless drills on sounding out familiar words are a waste. And it is certainly not helpful to limit young readers to material they already have phonic mastery over.
And what happened to reading, anyway? Reading is as much about learning to write, understand and appreciate the written language. It’s not about learning to make lists. We learn to read because we want to experience stories, instructions and educational materials, not because we want to be able to connect letters to sounds. We learn to read because we want to be able to express ourselves, and understand others. Early reading should emphasize the fun and adventure of books. It should encourage children to write as much as possible, because clear writing is one of the most important skills a student can learn. Instead, reading is reduced to a set of boring drills, lists of words, and stupid worksheets that teach kids nothing about how to appreciate the beauty and power of language
I agree that phonics are an important part of learning to read. I learned them myself. But I also…well…read. When I stumbled over words, someone was there to tell me how to say them and what they mean. I was challenged by my reading, not just forced to repeat sounds over and over again. I developed a love of literature at a young age, and was encouraged to write (which I’ve never lost) from the moment I could grasp a pencil. I was also taught with the understanding that no one technique teaches a kid everything they need to know, and no single method will work for every kid. The conservative push towards phonics is nothing more than an attempt to demean teachers, reduce their autonomy, and harass kids. Every good teacher knows that phonics are great. Every good teacher also knows that kids ought to be reading books in school.
I’ve seen my 2nd grade teacher friend grading papers on reading comprehension. Some of those youngsters are pretty darn smart!