Read this.

[teejay100000]

www.cps.org.uk/cps_catalog/why%20can%27t%20they%20read.pdf

fivecandles,

It is very apparent from your remarks that you have absolutely no idea of the principles and practice of synthetic phonics teaching.

The principles are that children are taught the alphabetic code, i.e the way that sounds are represented by a letter or group of letters in words. The English alphabetic code has two levels to it: the 'simple code' which is one way of representing each of the 44 ish 'sounds' of which English words are comprised, and the 'Advanced' (or 'complex' code) which covers the alternative ways that the sound/letter correspondences can be spelled. The total 'learning' involved is some 160 -180 (depending on which programme is being used) 'common correspondences'. It is assumed (and confirmed by research) that most children will be able to generalise their phonic knowledge to learn the more unusual correspondences as they encounter them in the course of their reading.

As the English code (by reason of our linguistic history) is more complex than that of many other countries it is reckoned to take 2 - 3 years to learn to read competently.

As the children learn the correspondences they put their knowledge to use by decoding and blending words to read them and segmenting (breaking the word into its component sounds) for spelling.

Learning the common correspondences for reading and spelling should take about 2 years (but of course this varies hugely depending on a child's apptitude for learning). Once the basic knowledge and the skills of decoding and segmenting are in place the child is then set to greatly expand its reading and written vocabulary. To do this the skills of decoding and segmenting are still needed! They will encounter thousands of unfamiliar words as they move up through the Key Stages and they will still need their decoding and blending skills to 'read' these new words. Likewise, they should initially use their segmenting skills for spelling unfamiliar words (As an adult you probably revert to decoding and blending when you encounter a new word). These are the skills which I am saying that teachers should know how to support at any stage in a child's education.

Once children have mastered the phonic knowledge and the skills of decoding and blending they don't need any other strategies.

Your ridiculous scenario of children doing the JP actions in Y2 is just plain ill informed and irresponsible.

mrz. I had Debbie Hepplewhite come and give a (free to them) training session for our primary 'feeder' schools 4 years ago! What happens to that knowledge...I'm sure that 50% of the course attendees say 'Yes, but I think...'

I wish you every success in your struggles!

In fivecandle's defence many primary teacher's hold the same belief that Jolly Phonics (insert any programme) is something that happens in reception and then the rest of the school can ignore phonics whereas in reality that is only the beginning.
Jolly Phonics introduces the basics that enable young children to decode some words but there lies the confusion that "some words can't be decoded" whereas they can be once a child has been taught all the graphemes.
We now teach phonics up to Y6 (no snakes or ants past reception) and normally by Y2 phonics is for spelling rather than reading.

maizieD I wholeheartedly agree with your points about the wide discrepancy between theory and practice in education. All those government diktats handed down that insist on using the imperative! Yet we still have pupils who cannot read and write.

I had a boy in Y11 last year who could do neither but he was still entered for GCSE English (twice). On both occasions he sat in the exam hall doodling.

For those other people who have been offended by some of my comments I would point out that illiteracy and academic inability are NOT the same thing. There are bright kids who can?t read and write adequately and so they cannot progress in their education because they did not acquire those skills at Primary school. The reasons for this failure are, of course, myriad. However, if these basic accomplishments are not learned at an early age it becomes increasingly hard to motivate a child to gain them as they enter secondary school where other pressures will begin to impact upon them.

5candles wrote: ?So much rubbish Breton. ANYONE can get involved in sport. Doesn't mean they have a chance of qualifying for the olympics.?

Where have I written that people shouldn?t get involved in sport?

I made the comparison between advanced academic education and professional sport because sport is the only area in school and society where it is taken for granted that only the best will do. No boy with poor spatial awareness and lacking co-ordination skills will ever be accepted into a Premier League football club. No one who can barely hit a ball will ever get to play at Wimbledon. Everyone accepts that only the best ever get to that standard.

A similar attitude should be adopted when it comes to higher academic education and only the best should be accepted. This doesn?t prevent anyone from studying and trying, and studying and trying again until they meet that required standard. It simply means they won?t gain the qualification or be accepted at university until they reach that level.

So in answer to your question ?Are you seriously suggesting that only people getting A grades should be allowed to go on to FE or HE?? My reply would be, in the main, Yes, although B grades could be considered, depending on performance at interview. Do I realize that I am talking about a very small minority, Yes. What would everyone else do? Something vocational.

We don?t need 50% going to university because look at what has happened. We have former FE colleges revamping themselves as second-rate ?universities? and ?degree? courses being offered in Accounting, Tourism and Leisure, and Resort Management. These are not degree subjects they are business qualifications. They are good, sound, business qualifications but they are not academic disciplines!

As a result of the increase in graduates we have seen the value of a degree plummet. Graduates are now ten a penny and can be required to do jobs for which, forty years ago, a couple of half-decent A levels would have been sufficient. In fact, the teenager forty years ago with a couple of half decent A levels would probably have had higher literacy skills and a better general education than many a graduate of today!

Breton - Have you read Matthew Crawford's "The Case for working with your hands..."? I think you'd find it interesting. He talks about our obsession with preparing our children for 'knowledge technology' jobs and neglecting educating them in anything practical.

'I disagree with the social / class label and believe it is a problem with society as a whole. A child who spends long hours in day care with poorly educated and low paid staff is as much at risk as any other child regardless of parent's class'

But not statistically. Children who have parents on low incomes are still least likely to achieve academic success and most likely to have problems with literacy. Something like 10 times less likely to get into top universities.

Maybe children where both parents work long hours are likely to be neglected but the dual incomes can bring other advantages - better schools, tutors, good quality childcare etc. Certainly I know families where this is the case. Not interested in the rights and wrongs of it but in the facts.

maisie, I am quite well informed about synthetic phonics, thanks and I really object to your patronising tone.

It is absolutely rubbish to say that phonic awareness alone is going to help children understand the MEANING of minute in the two sentences below where the word is not even pronounced the same depending on its CONTEXT:

1.) Look at the minute hand. What time is it?

2.) That ladybird is abolutely minute.

There are many other words like this e.g. live and live. English does not always work phonetically and certainly not logically.

'Once children have mastered the phonic knowledge and the skills of decoding and blending they don't need any other strategies.'

Yes, they need context and experience. And FGS they need enjoyment of learning and of whole texts. Yes, synthetic phonics may be brilliantly helpful but it is very, very boring for a bright child to spend too long looking at words in this way. I have two of them!!

'A similar attitude should be adopted when it comes to higher academic education and only the best should be accepted.'

BUt what planet are you living on Breton?? I will never be in the olympics but there is nothing to stop me joining my local netball team or are you saying there should be?

Likewise just because I teach kids who are not going to get into Oxbridge are you saying they should be denied access to university education at all?

Why?

Why is HE only for the elite. That is shocking and shameful just as much as it would be shocking to say I can't use my local pool because I'm not an olympic swimmer.

I thought education was about learning, broadening horizons and enjoyment. Why, why, why should that be denied to anyone who chooses and is able to be involved in it?

jackstarbright: No I haven't.

I've just read the taster on Amazon. It sounds interesting. I especially liked the bit where he described the trades and manufacturing being lumped together as "blue collar". He's right. There is a snobbery at work today, especially in Britain at the moment. Somehow if a qualification isn't a degree it's deemed less important and worthwhile.

I also agree with his idea about learning a trade and finding out how to cope when things go wrong!

If someone can mend a car, cut hair, lay bricks, or plaster a wall they?ll always be able to find work even if they only rely on word-of-mouth and the black economy. So why do perfectly respectable skills and business qualifications have to be dressed up as pseudo-degrees? I honestly don?t understand it.

Anyway, many thanks for the link ? I may order it from the library!

'We don?t need 50% going to university because look at what has happened. We have former FE colleges revamping themselves as second-rate ?universities? and ?degree? courses being offered in Accounting, Tourism and Leisure, and Resort Management.'

Such a lot of baloney. Who doesn't need 50% going to university?? How are you the judge of that?

Newsflash: the workplace and the world has changed since you went to university. There are very few jobs that require purely manual work now. Most require high level, transferrable skills and people are much more likely to move jobs and top up their skills and training.

And who are you to say what institutions are 'second rate'.

Actually, it's well known that the quality of teaching is often much, much better and courses much more progressive and inspiring in FE college adn former universities.

In Russell group universities your teaching may be 3 hours a week with a research student. Those lecturers who are well qualified and published have no qualifications or training in teaching and often no motivation. Often they resent the little teaching that they do.

'A similar attitude should be adopted when it comes to higher academic education and only the best should be accepted. This doesn?t prevent anyone from studying and trying, and studying and trying again until they meet that required standard. It simply means they won?t gain the qualification or be accepted at university until they reach that level. '

That IS exactly what DOES happen.

As I have said university entrance has never been more competitive.

Perhaps you need to do just a little bit more research yourself.

20 years ago Oxbridge routinely offered 2 Es at A Level and now you need up to 5A togethr with 9 + GCSEs at A-A. IDeally also with proven leadership skills, grade 8 piano, 2 otehr languages etc.

'In fact, the teenager forty years ago with a couple of half decent A levels would probably have had higher literacy skills and a better general education than many a graduate of today! '

Your evidence for this??

And even 40 years ago the world was a very different place.

And what the hell happened to learning for its own sake and to better yourself and the world.

It's the hypocrisy I can't stand. University was ok for me and mine but those working class kids what do they need it for??

'If someone can mend a car, cut hair, lay bricks, or plaster a wall they?ll always be able to find work even if they only rely on word-of-mouth and the black economy.'

Are you living in the same world as the rest of us? Have you heard of the recession? How many walls do you think are getting built and plastered at the moment?

You are pining for a mythical golden age.

5candles wrote: I will never be in the olympics but there is nothing to stop me joining my local netball team or are you saying there should be?"

No I'm not. I'm saying by all means join your local netball team, have fun, but accept that you're never going to be good enough for the Olympics.

Why is HE only for the elite? Because higher academic education is elitist - just like the Olympics. Education is about learning, broadening horizons and enjoyment and people can spend their lives attending public lectures on various topics, going to evening classes, reading about whatever interests them. In some instances that education will give them the necessary proficiency to apply for HE. However, I am arguing for a gold standard in academia. I am not denying anyone from going on to advanced academic education. They just have to demonstrate they have the ability to do so. Once again, we're back to the Olympic team!

Breton, you are an appalling snob and patronising to boot.

How many people playing for their local netball team do you imagine think that they're going to be in the olympics one day?

And how many people in FE think that they're going to be Einstein?

Are you really saying that only the intellecual (and almost certainly socially) elite are deserving of HE?

Because if you are you are positively Victorian.

And if your own kids achieved only C grades at A Level would you advise them to become bricklayers instead of going to university?

Higher education is already elitist. If you are very, very clever (and it helps if you are also very very rick) you go to Oxbridge and if you are not so clever you go to your local university if you're lucky.

Why shouldn't you get the education you want if you are prepared to work and pay for it?

Breton1900 what you may have failed to realise (I'm not sure what is included on Amazon) is that Matthew Crawford is an academic who also runs a motorbike repair business not because he can't compete in HE but because he believes greater satisfaction comes from manual competence than brain power ...www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPoLDiTO3zc

I'm beginning to think you do live in a different country Breton. There IS a gold standard. Do you not read the papers?

'Cap on student numbers means one in three applicants will not get university places. Up to 200,000 would-be students will be turned away this year'

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/jan/14/cap-student-numbers-unprecedented-demand]]

Breton I completely agree with just about everything you've written. That's all I've time for but do carry on, do carry on. Lovely to read, refreshing as a drink of water.

mrz: I'm fully aware of that and read the taster on Amazon. He has a fair point. Most of us enjoy doing something practical and it can be very therapeutic.

However, when I suggested to RollaCoasta that some less academically able kids might enjoy a manual occupation such as painting the school's fence or working in the school's allotment I was chastised for being elitist.

Read this from letters page in The Guardian last week and tell me that there is no gold standard and that HE is not elitist!!

'Stand-out students

Last week Jessica Shepherd reported on reasons given to a headteacher by universities for rejecting very bright students.

This year we had 16 applicants per place for four places. Three As (or the equivalent IB or overseas qualification) are required, so your three-As student achieved only the minimum to be considered. Other applicants were predicted as many as seven As in more rigorous subjects, 1.0 in the Abitur, 44/45 in the IB, perfect scores in the US SATs, or similar. UK students had up to 13 A*s at GCSE.

All the students had strong personal statements, which mentioned their lifelong interest in the subject, their musical and sporting prowess, their voluntary work, and their career aspirations to benefit humanity. This strong pool of students, most of whom deserve admission but whom government quotas decree I must reject, explains why I spend roughly 10 days (2.5 per student admitted) between 1 October and Christmas just on admissions, as well as five days on open days, talking to teachers, and so on during the rest of the year.

What would it take to make your student stand out in this competitive global cohort? (1) Engaging in verbal conversation with tutors with confidence and intelligence. (2) Reading and writing English correctly, legibly and fluently, which are measured by additional subject-specific tests and interviews.

Unfortunately, the recommendations provided by your school do not provide enough evidence for why your student will perform better than others who are applying. Next year, show me why it is worth my while to spend that 20 hours on your student rather than another.

Molly001, Oxbridge tutor via EducationGuardian.co.uk'

www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/jul/20/education-letters-university-places

As I said Breton1900 I wasn't sure what was included on Amazon (not having looked)

'Cap on student numbers means one in three applicants will not get university places. Up to 200,000 would-be students will be turned away this year'

That has nothing to do with the abilities of the candidates it is simply to do with the number of places available. Given the recession it seems that many school-leavers are seeking university placements as a way of stalling starting work, probably in the hope that three years hence that unemployment levels may have gone down.

Quantity does not equate with quality!