What do you think of the Education White Paper?

[Shamster]

Our head went through the key points at last nights staff meeting and the effect was pretty depressing. Sounds stupid but two of us almost started crying! Just wondered if anyone has read it for themselves, rather than picking up whichever bits each paper decides to highlight according to their leanings. If you have; what do you think?

moondog - you followed me onto this thread having made rather more than an arse of yourself.

Psycho is the word I would use.

People in glass houses etc.

I fear for your blood pressure you mad bint.

Well, that was a typically 'normal comment.

Haven't you got some dead people to go and laugh at?

Must be a tragedy somewhere.

You could have a field day.

At least making an arse of oneself won't have the feminists objecting .

Stop hurling insults at each other - you are on the same side ffs ( and I don't normally swear).

I like you, pickledsiblings (sorry, I missed the 'l' in your name previously - it's much better with it in).

I think you're onto a loser here, but I admire your persistence enormously. :)

And I refuse to be on the same side as her (him?).

Whatever side s/he was on I would cross on principle.

Just as well this is MN, what a wasted effort, just like the white paper. Not worth the paper it's written on, when the very people who are being relied upon to follow the new recommendations, don't have the intellect to actually discuss it's implications.

What a shame that a bunch of "well educated" teachers are unable to have a sensible and rational debate.

What is the obsession with phonics? Have any of you actually read the paper. Are you not concerned about free schools, academies, private/public partnerships, parents demanding and having access to ever greater information and calling schools to account, are you really so dogmatic and blinkered that you can spend days attacking each other and arguing about phonics!

Are you a teacher, Mini?

Yes, I teach maths. I have read the white paper and I have my own concerns mainly relating to choice. Free schools, specialist schools and academies set up to offer choice, but when you read further, LEA will still administer the school admissions! Puzzled doesn't even cut it

Mini, I've read the entire white paper and wanted to get feedback about it as a whole hence the name of the posting. I am entirely with you with your concerns. I wish that more people had read it so this could have developed into a sensible debate. Some people tried to get it back on track but went away again when they saw what was happening. I'm afraid i can't ignore it when i feel under attack but to be honest, 'phonics' are the least of my worries about this whole thing although it is worrying that there are fanatical teachers. Free schools worry me immensly as does the Academy programme. I like schools working together. Hadn't thought about the choice thing though. Very odd. Good point.

granted Sun 28-Nov-10 21:35:00

mrz, I have a suspicion you're trying to confuse with long words.

Which long word/s would that be granted?

Shamster,

Why don't you just start another thread? If you can do that without disparagingione of the very few sensible parts of the White Paper (improving phonics teaching) then you may get the discussion you are after.

mrz - could you explain how your post here:

"Actually I have never picked you up on it because I only read the thread from where you said phonetically regular which is what I am trying to tell you. The (phonetics) sounds of the English language are regular, what is irregular is the orthographical system used to record those sounds."

refutes shamster's point that the way the language is written is irregular, and that therefore teaching phonic 'rules' is not always the easiest/best/only way to teach reading.

If that is what you're saying - if not, feel free to clarify what it is you are saying.

Saying that the sounds of English are phonetically 'regular' seems meaningless in the context of reading.

Exactly as is saying the sounds of the English language are irregular (which they aren't) as you and Sham have continued to assert.

big words

Phonetically

1. Of or relating to phonetics.
2. Representing the sounds of speech with a set of distinct symbols, each designating a single sound: phonetic spelling.(which doesn't use the alphabetic code -
3. Of, relating to, or being features of pronunciation that are not phonemically distinctive in a language, as aspiration of consonants or vowel length in English.

Irregular
flawed, damaged, or failing to meet a specific standard

assert

to state with assurance, confidence, or force; state strongly or positively

"shamster's point that the way the language is written is irregular, and that therefore teaching phonic 'rules' is not always the easiest/best/only way to teach reading"

I think that statement on Shamster's part demonstrates her confusion about the teaching of phonics. There aren't any 'phonics rules'. There are letter to sound correspondences which vary according to the etymology of the word or the arbitary decisions on spellings made by dictionary compilers, such as Dr. Johnson. Trying to teach 'rules' in phonics is doomed to failure and is, in part, what gives it a bad name because people expect 'rules'and get upset when it isn't that simple.

On the other hand, trying to teach children to read by picture clues and guessing is unforgivable...

Also - sorry, shamster, I don't wish to drag the thread back to phonics, despite your best efforts to keep it on track! but both as a parent and as a teacher in a related field, I've found this thread fascinating as an eye into a totally different world, and would like to know more... - so would be grateful if all those on this thread who've protested in favour of phonics being the be-all and end-all of teaching reading skills, could tell me what exactly phonics done right should be like?

This especially applies to maizie (? - correct name?), as she was so insistent that only those who had not seen phonics 'done right' could fail to see its merits.

Maybe she's right - maybe phonics is that good. If so, what as a parent of a 4 year-old should I be doing/expecting of his teachers?

As in step-by-step, please (links will do, though explanations welcome).

In particular, I'm concerned about the impact of phonics on spelling, as the danger (that I've seen in those taught primarily through phonics) is a tendency to try to spell words as they sound, which is clearly not going to get you very far in English! It might well work better in reverse, ie when decoding words not trying to write them down yourself; but I don't really get how knowing that that the 'ay' sound, say, can be written as 'a' or 'ay' or 'ai' etc is going to help you one little to bit to spell words with an 'a' sound in, without just going back to learning them all of by heart - in which case why not do that from scratch, and learn to recognise the whole word when you learn to read?

Genuinely interested to hear your replies.

At least one of you described yourselves as ' evangelical' - feel free to try to convert me to the cause.

I'm open to ideas.

mrz - your post doesn't make any sense - you appear to be saying that English is phonetically regular when written in the phonetic alphabet - obviously that's a truism, but English is not written in the phonetic alphabet! Children don't read using the phonetic alphabet!

So how is this relevant?

Oh, hello maizie - I did get your name right! - you're up early too!

Please see my post above and respod - it was directed particularly at you.

granted as I said (I will try to keep it simple)

I hadn't read the whole thread from the beginning. I opened it at the point Sham said English is phonetically irregular and replied based on that post and subsequent (occurring or coming later or after ) posts.

Sham said she had corrected her initial post which simply said English isn't a phonetic language (minus the irregular) and I still haven't read

Maybe what we have here, mrz, is a disagreement based on terminilogy rsather thn ideology?

I find it hard to believe you thought shamster or anyone else was claiming that the phonetic alphabet didn't 'match' English sounds; what I and I think she was referring to was the way the English alphabet matched English sounds. s that is what is used for reading, which is what the whole argument was about.

Ooops - excuse lousy typing...

granted, you may find this page about synthetic phonics useful:

www.dyslexics.org.uk/main_method_3.htm

HTH

granted
English language is phonetically regular because phonetic refers to the sounds of a spoken language
English orthography (a method of spelling, as by the use of an alphabet) is irregular

granted I only mentioned the phonetic alphabet because I didn't want you to think I was referring to the English alphabet I now realise I shouldn't have confused you further by mentioning it.