| IN 1989, WHEN GAYLE CLOUD'S
TWIN BOYS entered the first grade, her California district had just introduced the state's
version of the "whole language" method of teaching reading. Her children were
assigned good books but given few tools to help them figure out unfamiliar words. Vowel
sounds, word families, even silent E remained a mystery. What happened? Spelling skills
dropped: homework was returned filled with errors. First-grade reading scores in the
Riverside district slipped by 7 percent that year, and have been falling ever since. The
rest of the state fared no better. Last March, U.S. Secretary of Education, Richard Riley
announced that California tied for last place in the most recent national reading tests. That did it for Cloud. The 46-year-old mother of six became yet
another convert to the nationwide movement to revive the phonics approach to reading.
Phonics was once blamed for turning school children into repeat-after-me robots. But now,
alarmed by low reading scores, state after state is trying to return to phonics, which
teaches kids how to make connections between symbols and sounds. California passed the
"ABC" bill last year, requiring, among other things, that textbooks include
lessons on spelling and alphabet sounds. Another bill would require new teachers to take
phonics courses to be certified. North Carolina is urging schools to teach alphabet
sounds. Nebraska and Virginia have settled on a mix of both decoding words and reading
literature. Even GOP presidential candidate Bob Dole cast his ballot for phonics, saying
recently that California's whole-language "fad" has produced "disastrous
results."
The Great Debate over reading methods has raged for
centuries. Educator Horace Mann warned in the 19th century that letters of the alphabet
were "bloodless, ghostly apparitions." Still, phonics continued to dominate
until the late 1930's, when Scott Foresman published its "Dick and Jane" series.
These ubiquitous readers were designed to teach children to read not by repeating sounds
but by learning simple words.
Proponents of whole language believe that reading is learned best when
the child is immersed in real books and real writing. The theory is that children can
figure out what words mean by seeing them in context. Children are encouraged to skip
unfamiliar words. Overall understanding, not word-by-word accuracy, is the goal.
Whole-language advocates insist that phonics were never given short shrift. Kenneth
Goodman professor of reading at the University of Arizona, says decoding skills should be
taught as one of many strategies.
Like most education issues, reading methods are a political
battleground. Boodman believes whole language has become just another easy target for
right-wingers intent on narrowing the scope of public education. There's more to schooling
than reading, he says, and more to reading than phonics. But, critics ask, what's more
basic than learning to read? "There is strong evidence that a lot of kids just aren't
getting it with whole language." says former California school superintendent Bill
Honig, now a phonics crusader.
Most research backs the need for lots of phonics, the sooner the better.
While many beginners may be able to figure out what words mean by their context, most
children-particularly those having trouble-need help learning the shapes and sounds of
English. The brain has no inherent knowledge of the alphabet, says Dr. Frank Vellutino,
director of the child-research center at SUNNY-Albany. It has to be taught.
The most successful schools are those that compromise, blending the best
of phonics and whole language. Teachers at Rosendale Elementary in Niskayuna, N.Y.,
realized several years ago that whole language was not enough without daily phonics, so
they developed a system combining the two. After just two years, the number of children
needing remedial reading was reduced considerably. Children, the teachers insist, tackle
literature with more confidence now that they are armed with better skills. And phonics,
they've proved,does not have to be "drill and kill." Second graders in Karen
Hess's class wriggle with excitement as she holds up a flashcard. First the children
"chunk" it into syllables and identify the letter combination ("auc")
and spelling pattern ("-tion"). Then they rotate their arms like a steam engine
to help their brains connect the parts. "Auction!" several shouted last week,
and one of them added: "Like Jackie O!" With Jeanne Gordon in
Los Angeles. |
