How bad would it be if I taught my daughter to read...

[JeanBodel]

---using whole word recognition rather than phonics?

She's 3, she loves books, she wants to read them herself. She's an autumn birth so she won't go to school for another two years. I don't think either of us can wait that long for her to start reading independently.

I've got a whole set of Peter and Jane's (yes, the very set I learnt with 30 years ago). I really don't want to spend lots of money on Jolly Phonics when I know I can teach her with the books I already own.

I just dread getting into trouble with the reception teacher. I don't mean to criticise teachers or phonics in any way. I can see how annoying it would be to have a kid in your class who's shouting out the word without segmenting it.

All advice gratefully received.

[KatharineClifton]

Why not do both? I taught mine on Peter and Jane, starting at age 2. Worked well. Phonics are naturally part of teaching to read.

I didn't get told off by school. Just took in the book they were currently reading at home and they went 7 levels up on the reading scheme.

[tobyrat]

I think that it would be a bad idea (sorry!). I have a child in Y1 and phonics has been and still is such a huge part of the school's approach to reading and spelling. If a child went to my child's school reading with full word recognition, they would still be put through the school's phonics program, right from the start. You don't need to spend lots of money on the jolly phonics stuff - you can print off the 42 sounds from the internet. I also have a 3yo and she has learnt around half the sounds and can use them to read simple words like "cat", "hen" etc. I think the govt. has made the phonics approach mandatory in schools or certainly highly recommended that schools all do it (although I could be quite wrong!).

[dontlikemondays]

The Jolly phonics thing works because pointing out a letter C that is named "see" but is pronounced as a hard "K" is a bit confusing, so its just naming the letters as they sound, which we naturally tend to do anyway when trying to read an unfamiliar word.

As long as it makes sense to your DD it won't hurt her to do it the old fashioned way. It may however make foundation year a bit boring for her if she's too far advanced, as they just go back to the beginning so that all children are on a level.

I would be tempted to read TO her rather than necessarily teach her to read at this point because I'm a bit lazy there's plenty of time for that later.

[KatharineClifton]

I actually thought that all parents taught their children to read before school, so was quite surprised when it came to it. I think it is one of the best things I could of done for my DC. And they both still love reading. I do know that different kids are ready at different times though!

We didn't make it to the end of Peter and Jane, as by that stage the books were pretty dull to my DC compared to all the other books they had available to them.

[stickylittlefingers]

there was a programme a while back about teaching children to read, with the reading tsar or whatever she's called. Anyway, she approved of whatever worked for the child. So if whole word recognition works for yours, why not?

I think it has to be a mix anyway - DD2 is in the throes of learning atm, and she uses and mixture of strategies (not that I've told her to, just she does what makes sense to her at the time). With DD1 I felt a bit bullied into using the Jolly phonics, and she ended up sounding out for much too long (and for words where it wouldn't work anyway), so she had to be told to use whole word recognition.

What I'm saying in a long-winded way is (a) it's probably not too good to get wedded to one system to the exclusion of others and (b) what works is fine.

[reallytired]

This website is free

www.starfall.com

It has lots of stories for teaching children to read. As it uses a phonics approach, it would not confuse your dd.

[JeanBodel]

Thanks for the comments.

I think it would end up being both. Even doing whole word recognition you end up sounding out the phonemes for the hard words.

I know the phonics system and I know it works. It's just...longer, you know? All that jumping around with flash cards. I do have the sounds but I think I'd have to invest in a few basic readers to practice them on.

At the end of the day, if I teach her to read, using any system, I guess she'll be ahead at school. And I'm pretty sure I want to teach her. She's completely ready.

To put this in perspective, I made no attempt at all to teach her older brother, because he wasn''t interested. I know when I was a child I was obsessed with books and my parents taught me to read at this age. I suppose I just want to hand that on to my daughter.

[Mashabell]

U can't do any harm at all, if your dd is keen to learn.

My dd is about your age and i started her off with a few Peter and Jane books to give her the basic idea of how letters work, but she was not very impressed with those books and asked to learn with 'real' ones, the ones we had been reading to her and she almost knew by heart. - She learned to read mainly by linking the words in her head with the ones on the page.

She was fluent by the time she started school and my dh and i drummed it into her that she should not be big-headed because of it, because children are different, etc.

It did her no harm whatsoever.

I have 2 granddaughters who have been learning in a similar way, although not quite as early and making far more use of the phonics teaching at school, but they have found the pace frustratingly slow and have moved on to other reading at home.

My son and gradson were/are very different.

[twolittlemonkeys]

My DS1 started looking at Peter and Jane books too (using look-say approach) before he was 3 but combined it with phonics to help him decode new words. He could read out anything you put in front of him before he started school, so it hasn't done him any harm, and now he's in year 1 he happily goes to the library and picks any book which takes his fancy! He still does work based on ORT guided reading books they use in school, despite the fact they don't challenge his reading skills - he enjoys following the adventures of the characters etc.

[JeanBodel]

Reallytired Thanks for the website, will check it out.

Lots of encouraging stories, thank you. I'll do it. Here is Peter, here is Jane, here we come.

[DeWe]

If she's keen it does work. I found that having done the whole word recognition they all seemed to just work out the phonics on their own with very little stress.

Btw all three of mine loved the Jane and Peter books. They may be boring for adults, but they would choose them again and again (groan from me inside!). I think they did like the feeling of having read the whole book without help.

One word of warning on them, though. They are very long. Both dd1 and dd2 would read, say 5-6 pages, at a time. Ds was not having that. he wanted to read the whole book at once, which was very tiring (for me)

It's not been a problem for school at at all. They do work on the phonics separately, but ds (who is struggling in some ways at school being a summer baby) loves the reading he's doing at school. He started year R on level 4, and last week had a level 5, and can do simple phonics work, but because he has whole word recognition can read harder books which keep him interested.

And I have three children (year6, year3 and yearR) who love reading, will go off to their rooms and read to themselves. Disadvantage is when they look over your shoulder and spell out "what's ge-n-o-cide, mummy?" When you're reading the news, as dd2 (age 4) did...

[OhBuggerandArse]

I think it's a very good idea to use a combined approach - the phonics-only method leaves a lot to be desired, and most educationalists would tell you that.

The reason it's pushed so strongly is really a government-led thing, because it gives good, measurable-target results, particularly across a mean. But those results can't measure an individual kid's total reading experience or their emotional relationship to reading, both of which are considerably enhanced by the more immediate reward of learning to read whole words, particularly those which have some interest or significance to them.

What's ideal is a broad and deep approach to pre-literacy and early literacy - letters and phonics sure, but also whole word stuff (give her words she likes printed out big, that she can carry around with her and crumple/shred/read to her stuffed dog), lots and lots of sharing books and talking about how they work, looking together at words, and above all enjoying them. If you do all that your daughter will show you where to go with it.

[maizieD]

I would strongly advise steering clear of whole word. It may not be harmful for your child, but you wouldn't know if it was or not until the harm had been done! Phonics is truly the most effective method of teaching reading and there is absolutely no need to mix it with any whole word teaching at all.

I suggest that you invest in the Jolly Phonics Handbook, which will tell you all you need to know about how to teach your child to read. You don't need lots of elaborate resources, some lower case letters would be useful but you can do lots with pen and paper. You will need decodable books to support the phonics learning; I understand that you can get these from the Reading Chest - don't have a link, sorry)

Also, have a look at PHONICS INTERNATIONAL where you will find lots of extremely good advice from a nationally recognised expert in phonics teaching.

[OhBuggerandArse]

Well, as you can probably guess from my post above, I think that phonics-only is probably pretty harmful itself. We won't know, of course, until the research on its effects on this generation has time to be done.

For what it's worth, the three early-years teachers I know who've used phonics-only for (some of) their own children all wish they hadn't, and say that their other kids who they used a combined approach with are all happier, quicker and more fluent readers.

[IndigoBell]

happier, quicker and more fluent readers - that sounds like a very short term approach to assessing how good a learn to read scheme is.

Being able to read fluently at 5 isn't the goal.

Being able to decode new words and be a great speller is the goal. Something that get's more and more important the further up the school you go.

[sospanfach]

what ohbuggerandarse said

[JeanBodel]

It's rather strong to suggest that whole-word is harmful. It isn't harmful. It might be harmful to use only whole-word (or only-phonics), if by harmful you mean it might not match my daughter's preferred learning style.

Phonics is good, but let's not forget that millions of children, including probably everyone on this website, was successfully taught to read using whole-word recognition.

Anyway, I agree with OhBugger that a combined approach is best.

[OhBuggerandArse]

Well, no, not short term - because they're now older kids at the top end of primary and secondary school. But I shouldn't have mentioned it, it's anecdotal. And nobody's suggesting you shouldn't do phonics at all, just that there might be shortcomings in restricting a child to any one single method.

But if the goal is being able to decode new words and spell well, then the best way to do that is to read a lot. And surely happiness and independence and fluency in reading are totally relevant to that?

[OhBuggerandArse]

(sorry, X-posted - that was in response specifically to IndigoBell)

[IndigoBell]

By harmful I think they mean it could make them poor spellers, and unable to decode new words, so ultimately bad readers. So harmful to them academically.

if the goal is being able to decode new words and spell well, then the best way to do that is to read a lot. ? Only if you have the skills to work out what a new word is when you see it. Otherwise seeing new words won't help you at all.

[IndigoBell]

The majority of kids can work out how English decoding works by learning via whole words. But not all.

If you show my DS (Y6) a new word (eg a person's surname) he is totally unable to read it at all.

Nobody realises this because he covers it up very well.

This is not common. But it does happen. And this is what you're trying to guard against by not teaching via whole words.

[OhBuggerandArse]

Actually, this really annoys me - the idea that parents are being made to feel that anything they might do in relation to encouraging their children in early literacy might be harmful. Are there really people who feel that they shouldn't tell their kids what a 'whole' word says just in case it interferes with the painfully slow, letter by letter sound by sound process they get put through in school? I can't imagine a better way to shut off a child's natural inquisitiveness and love for reading. And all because some government policy wonk wanted some good headlines about changing educational methodologies. Talk to real educationalists with a range of views, please. Grr, etc.

(Actually, maybe that would be a good Mumsnet webchat - get some different perspectives aired rather than just the Jolly Phonics propaganda)

[OhBuggerandArse]

But IndigoBell, nobody is suggesting that you shouldn't use phonics as part of the range of skills you give to children. Just that they shouldn't be the only ones on offer.

[JeanBodel]

I don't think anyone would use a whole-word system without mixing in a bit of phonics, would they? I remember when I was at school back in t'day, it was officially whole-word but in practice phonics were taught too. Although obviously not to the extent they are today.

Anyway, I agree with everything OnBugger says. FWIW, I hear that phonics has been measured as the best approach for 60% of children (sorry I can't reference that, got it from a deputy-head friend of mine).

[reallytired]

Antedotally I think that phonics is fab. It enchances the child's ablity to write as well as teaching them to read. My son has done really well with phonics and so have his classmates. It is a clear logical way forward and the complexities of English are introduced as a pace a child can cope with.

I think what maizieD is thinking of is a reading reflex. A child who is taught by whole word will use guessing as their first stragery where as a phonics taught child will sound out a strange word. The phonics approach leads to more accurate decoding and less mistakes.

Certainly there are studies which show that synthetic phonics is more effective for the early stages of teaching reading. It make the biggest children for dyslexic children and there is no way of telling if a child is dyslexic before you attempt to teach them to read.