How would you respond to this?

Peter Warner · **Posted:** Thu Aug 02, 2007 3:32 pm

Dear RRF:

In another internet forum, the passage pasted below was posted by someone who has helped develop a 'linguistic phonics' curriculum. I'm not sure if the description is describing Linguistic Phonics, or a certain curriculum which is being called 'linguistic phonics'. I'm very curious what others think of this:

Quote:

I thought you might find it helpful, particularly with EFL [English as a Foreign Language] students to know a more about the differences between synthetic and linguistic phonics. A synthetic approach teaches pupils sounds and then matches each sound to a grapheme. ... Linguistic phonics is based on speech - the starting point is very different and has been very successful with our EAL [English as Additional Language] pupils here. We begin by developing oral language.

To introduce the code, we would say a word (perhaps showing an object or picture) e.g. ‘man’ and the pupils orally segment this, identifying each sound that they can hear. As each sound is identified, we match a symbol (letter) to it, through a process of elimination. A key element of the methodology is in ‘working out the code’ (often by trial and error!) rather than being told the sounds and corresponding letters.

At stage 1 we explore the concept that sounds are represented by letters, learning to segment, blend and manipulate phonemes, using only the most common representations of sounds (cvc) e.g. yes, got, cat, sun, hip

At stage 2 we look at longer words containg the most common representations e.g. ( cvcc) went, (ccvc) stop (ccvcc) stand

During these early stages we also build nonsense words. This not only ensures the development of phonetic knowledge but also prepares the reader for dealing with ‘blocks of nonsense’ in multisyllable words in the future e.g. ‘Sep’ ‘tem’ ‘ber’

At stage 3 we introduce the concept that longer words are made up of blocks of sound. Again the initial activities are oral. We ask students to identify the number of syllables in words, perhaps by tapping.
We then build up words, syllable -by-syllable, using one-letter-one-sound.

At stage 4, we introduce the concept that sometimes a sound is represented by more than one letter e.g. ‘f’ ‘i’ ’sh. Again, we begin with the oral word. The students identify the sounds they can hear, matching each sound to a symbol. By a process of elimination, they ‘discover’ ’sh’ etc.

At stage 5, we introduce two very important concepts:
a sound can be represented in different ways e.g. ‘my’ ‘high’ ‘kite’
the same symbol can represent different sounds ‘my’ ‘happy’

A synthetic approach introduces each grapheme one at a time. Linguistic phonemes helps students ‘discover’ them all at once! Again, starting from speech, they listen to a short passage or poem containing the target sound. Each time they hear a word containing the sound they shout it out.
Then we ‘discover’ how the sound has been represented in different ways by looking at the written words and locating the spelling of the target sound e.g. ’see’ ‘he’ ‘happy’ ‘eat’
Pupils sort and search for words containing the target sound to help build up their orthograhic knowledge.

A stage 6 word is a multi-syllable word that contains stage 5 concepts- these present more difficulty for the reader because they have to deal wtih syllables and code variation in one word.

The challenge seems to be in creating a climate investigation, in whcih the students become ‘code-crackers’, working out the complexities of English together.

Does that strike you as an accurate description of Synthetic and Linguistic Phonics?

If someone presented their program to you in those words, how would you respond?

Best regards, Peter Warner.

chew8 · **Joined:** Sun Nov 02, 2003 6:26 pm **Posts:** 2292

Just a quick response for now. As so often, I think a lot hangs on the meanings one attaches to terms.

Diane McGuinness talks about 'synthetic and 'linguistic' phonics in 'Early Reading Instruction'. Here's what she says on p. 130:

'LINGUISTIC PHONICS (not to be confused with "linguistic programs, circa 1960s)

a. Incomplete (Called synthetic in the United Kingdon.) Teaches from the sound to the letter. Teaches the 40+ phonemes of English and their main spellings (basic code), plus some spelling alternatives.
b. Complete. Teaches (a) above plus 136 spelling alternatives.

So she regards 'synthetic' phonics as 'linguistic' phonics but as incomplete. I think that some UK s.p. programmes are a bit more letter-to-sound than she suggests and that they would want to emphasise that they teach pronunciation alternatives as well as spelling alternatives, but this is not the place to go into that kind of detail.

Re. the following which Peter quotes:

'A synthetic approach introduces each grapheme one at a time. Linguistic phonemes helps students ‘discover’ them all at once! Again, starting from speech, they listen to a short passage or poem containing the target sound. Each time they hear a word containing the sound they shout it out.
Then we ‘discover’ how the sound has been represented in different ways by looking at the written words and locating the spelling of the target sound e.g. ’see’ ‘he’ ‘happy’ ‘eat’'

Although UK synthetic phonics programmes tend to introduce graphemes one at a time, they get children reading and spelling with these graphemes (and the phonemes children have been taught for them) as soon as they have learnt the first 3 to 5 (3 in 'Fast Phonics First, 4 in 'Letters and Sounds', 5 in 'Jolly Phonics'), and from then on, grapheme-phoneme correspondences are used in the reading and spelling of words as they are introduced.

Linguistic phonics programmes may get children to 'discover' graphemes (and phonemes??) 'all at once', but they surely don't get children using all these grapheme-phoneme correspondences at once. As the writer quoted by Peter says, they start with 'only the most common representations of sounds (cvc) e.g. yes, got, cat, sun, hip' - so does synthetic phonics. My understanding is that it's only after this simple beginning that linguistic phonics programmes move on to help children ‘discover’ how sounds are 'represented in different ways by looking at the written words and locating the spelling of the target sound e.g. ’see’ ‘he’ ‘happy’ ‘eat’ '

Jenny C.

maizie · **Posted:** Thu Aug 02, 2007 9:45 pm

Quote:

At stage 5, we introduce two very important concepts:
a sound can be represented in different ways e.g. ‘my’ ‘high’ ‘kite’
the same symbol can represent different sounds ‘my’ ‘happy’

A synthetic approach introduces each grapheme one at a time. Linguistic phonemes helps students ‘discover’ them all at once! Again, starting from speech, they listen to a short passage or poem containing the target sound. Each time they hear a word containing the sound they shout it out.
Then we ‘discover’ how the sound has been represented in different ways by looking at the written words and locating the spelling of the target sound e.g. ’see’ ‘he’ ‘happy’ ‘eat’
Pupils sort and search for words containing the target sound to help build up their orthograhic knowledge.

I'm puzzling over these statements. They seem to me to be incompatible. How can they say that students 'discover graphemes all at once', yet not introduce the alternative ways of spelling sounds until 'step 5'?

It all sounds a little bit muddled to me. My initial reaction was 'constructivism meets phonics....'

chew8 · **Joined:** Sun Nov 02, 2003 6:26 pm **Posts:** 2292

Yes. I, too, felt the inconsistency that Maizie mentions. On reflection, I think that this person has expressed him/herself in a rather muddled way. What he/she probably means is that alternative spellings for the same sound are not introduced in Steps 1-4, but when they are introduced, in Step 5, all the alternatives are introduced at once.

This person says that 'linguistic phonics' begins with 'speech' or the 'oral word': To introduce the code, we would say a word (perhaps showing an object or picture) e.g. ‘man’ and the pupils orally segment this, identifying each sound that they can hear. Surely, though, the children would not just immediately be adept at 'identifying each sound that they can hear' - they would need some teaching in order to be able to do this (Diane calls it 'unglueing' the sounds in 'Why Children Can't Read).

If starting by segmenting the spoken word is a key feature of 'linguistic phonics' (but is it?), I think it is a difference between it and synthetic phonics. The key feature of s.p. is the emphasis on synthesising (blending) letter-prompted individual sounds into whole spoken words (which is what we have to do in reading) and not so much on starting with whole spoken words and segmenting them (which is what we have to do in spelling).

Jenny C.

Susan Godsland · **Posted:** Fri Aug 03, 2007 8:57 am

Here's how it's done:

http://www.belb.org.uk/teachers/LPTalk/ ... b.2006.pdf

Years 4-7 :eek:

chew8 · **Joined:** Sun Nov 02, 2003 6:26 pm **Posts:** 2292

Well, this is Years 4-7, and it assumes that children already have some letter-knowledge (either names or sounds). What happens in Year R, though?

Jenny C.

maizie · **Posted:** Fri Aug 03, 2007 3:24 pm

Is that 'age' 4-7' or 'school years' 4 -7? If it is the latter there is something very amiss with the teaching of reading in N Ireland :???:

I, too, was wondering if this was for initial teaching, as it seems to presuppose some letter knowledge.

chew8 · **Joined:** Sun Nov 02, 2003 6:26 pm **Posts:** 2292

If you click on Susan's link, it definitely says YEAR 4-7. I've also had a quick look at the Stranmillis College evaluation of linguistic phonics in Belfast - they don't seem to have looked at anything below Y2.

Jenny C.

JIM CURRAN · **Joined:** Fri Oct 31, 2003 7:18 am **Posts:** 1495

I’m not sure when the Linguistic Phonics programme is introduced in primary schools in the Belfast area. I’m fairly sure however that it doesn’t happen in Primary 1. The Belfast Board , Stranmillis College and Queens University are heavily involved in the Enriched Curriculum Project.

The principal aspirations and qualities of the Enriched Curriculum may be summarised as follows:
• Removal of the early experience of persistent failure for the child. This is seen as a primary goal and the basis for the child’s development of appropriate coping skills when confronted with later difficulties in learning.
• The belief that the young child learns best through play, story-related activities and play-like teacher-directed activities.
• Postponement of the use of formal reading schemes until the teacher assesses the child to be ready, whilst at the same time concentrating on oral language and emergent literacy activities. This is accomplished by a wide and eclectic range of activities.
• Postponement of formal recorded arithmetic whilst laying the foundations for a strong sense of number through practical work in sorting, matching, counting, and seriation together with frequent opportunities to absorb early mathematical concepts and language in a cross-curricular mode.
• Promotion of good motor development at gross and fine levels through appropriate indoor and outdoor activities, including very active physical play.
• Encouragement of creativity through activities such as art, music and role play.
• Development of pro-social behaviour through promotion of self-regulation and modelling by the teacher.
• An emphasis on encouraging the children be independent and to take responsibility for their own learning.

Peter Warner · **Posted:** Sun Aug 05, 2007 8:31 am

Thank you all for your consideration and comments.

The passage that I quoted at the start of this thread was apparently written by someone involved with the program reported about in this BBC article:

http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6731899.stm

which indeed occurred in Belfast. The writer isn't here to defend themselves, I copied it from another forum, so it wouldn't be fair to identify the author.

There are several things in that quoted description that make me uncomfortable. Overall, it does not seem consistent with an explicit, systematic approach to giving instruction in the Alphabetic Code.

'Constructivism meets phonics' nails it, Maizie.

Jenny is exactly right about the difficulties children have in identifying and isolating sounds in spoken speech. The approach described, beginning with spoken words and then analyzing how the sounds are represented by the letters in that word seems fairly close to Analytic Phonics, which begins with written words (I think).

Quote:

As each sound is identified, we match a symbol (letter) to it, through a process of elimination. A key element of the methodology is in ‘working out the code’ (often by trial and error!) rather than being told the sounds and corresponding letters.

This is the opposite of systematic and explicit instruction. It seems intentionally designed to force the child to guess things through. I think it was Tom Burkard who wrote that 'trial and error' usually produced exactly that- error and trial. I think the curriculum as described is based on flawed educational concepts, and reveals a resistance to clear instruction.

What further bothers me is that the curriculum designers have hijacked the label 'Linguistic Phonics' and taken it as their own. They are welcome to their own work, obviously, but they should give their own creation its own name. Either they are unaware of the work of McGuinness and others, or they are attempting to gain credibility by associating with the label. Both options are rather condemning.

Of course, it's better than Whole Language, and it will get better results than no code instruction at all. But they shouldn't call it 'Linguistic Phonics'.

Best regards, Peter Warner.

chew8 · **Joined:** Sun Nov 02, 2003 6:26 pm **Posts:** 2292

What further bothers me is that the curriculum designers have hijacked the label 'Linguistic Phonics' and taken it as their own. They are welcome to their own work, obviously, but they should give their own creation its own name. Either they are unaware of the work of McGuinness and others, or they are attempting to gain credibility by associating with the label.

I myself certainly associate the term 'linguistic phonics' with Diane, but do we know for sure that it originated with her?

Regardless of that, I'm afraid that the association of certain terms with different meanings by different people may now be an increasing problem. It has happened with 'synthetic' and 'analytic' phonics, too.

Jenny C.

g.carter · **Joined:** Wed Nov 05, 2003 7:41 pm **Posts:** 1768

As far as I know, the Belfast linguistic programme is a direct descendant from Diane McGuinness - and they attended Sounds-Write training before developing their version.

Debbie Hepplewhite · **Joined:** Mon Aug 29, 2005 4:13 pm **Posts:** 2153

This is an interesting topic point.

We may all build on the work of others intentionally or inadvertently but the question remains as to when a 'new' programme dilutes and distorts the good work of predecessors or whether the new programme refines and improves previous work.

Further, thinking about it, when does a new programme basically repeat another?

What is also interesting is the degree of transparency and good grace by which new programme writers are prepared to credit their predecessors' work.

Of course, this may be hard to do if new programmes are based on many people's work or based on what could be understood to be general intellectual property.

What amuses me is those people who claim some kind of 'orginality' in new programmes when others of us can see clearly the features of previous programmes and work! ;-)

What has struck me about programmes following on from much of the McGuinness' work is that overwhelming sense of 'revelation' leading to a degree of passionate zeal. The 'tenor' of the work and proponents can then appear rather worrying.

Well - I can honestly say that the my programme is based on the work of others or knowledge I have gleaned from others - I take no credit other than my attempt to give busy teachers and parents easily accessible material through which to develop the synthetic phonics teaching principles based on my own practical experiences and needs as a teacher! :roll:

Susan Godsland · **Posted:** Sun Aug 05, 2007 5:56 pm

Phil Beadle in today's Sunday Times
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_a ... 198104.ece

Quote:

4 (age 11-16) The kinetic technique or muscle memory: “I invented this,” says Beadle. “You can use it on any piece of information you need to commit to memory.” As your children proclaim, for instance, a maths formula, encourage them to devise a set of movements to accompany it. As they repeat both the formula and the sequence of movements, the formula will be automatically recalled by the action.

I'm sorry, Phil, but you certainly didn't invent it. For example, Jolly Phonics uses the kinetic technique -an action for every phoneme. Jolly Phonics didn't invent it either.

palisadesk · **Joined:** Sun Mar 20, 2005 2:11 pm **Posts:** 364

chew8 wrote:

[
I myself certainly associate the term 'linguistic phonics' with Diane, but do we know for sure that it originated with her?
Jenny C.

I associate the term "linguistic phonics" with D. McGuinness too, because she discusses it at length and has given a fairly elaborated definition of the term.

However, she didn't invent it. It was current in the USA in the 1970's (and before), and into the '80s when I went to graduate school. I was familiarized with the term there and also in a variety of teaching assignments and professional development sessions that dealt with linguistic phonics teaching materials of the day. One of these was the Lippincott program, which D.McG. mentions favourably, and which I taught in one school while getting my M.A. Others from the same time period, which she doesn't mention but were very similar to Lippincott, were the Canadian program, "Language Patterns," and two more USA ones, the Basic Reading Series (a K-2 program published by SRA), and the Merrill Linguistic Readers (not sure I have exact name of that correct).

None would have conformed exactly to D.McG.'s requirements-- I believe all included some "sight words" and the teaching of letter names, but at exactly what point these were introduced I don't remember. These programs all predated "Sesame Street" and the concomitant ubiquity of letter-names at the beginning. My recollection is that the sounds were introduced first, and letter names came later. These linguistic phonics approaches shared some other features in common -- controlled decodable text, introduction of vowel sounds only in context of a phonogram or word (this was to avoid the mis-learning that might occur because vowels in isolation tend to be distorted).

Blending phoneme-by-phoneme was not explicitly taught -- "sounding out" was, but not as directly, or discretely, as now. All included oral exercises that resembled today's "word family" approach but with a significant difference -- the similar words were presented, in various ways, as a pattern, but the initial consonant substitution exercises so popular today were NOT included. Also, along with the rhyming phonogram patterns, body-coda blending exercises were included in some of these programs (I can't remember which ones now, but Language Patterns for sure). Thus, children would learn to read initial consonants and vowels -- sort of like the old horn book syllables -- with variant endings, e.g. ca -- cap, cat, cash, can, cask, cast, etc. (but not call or car -- because the sound of the vowel is different there).

I don't recall *any* explicit work on individual phoneme blending or segmenting -- I first encountered that (and it was a EUREKA! moment ) some years later, when I was introduced to DISTAR (which does teach segmenting, although D.McG. did not seem aware of that, perhaps because it's taught as the reverse of the blending process, which is taught first. After a few weeks children are taught to say the sounds in a word and write them down, then check for accuracy by blending the sounds l-r. They do not use any letter names for this until many months later).

It's useful to have clearer definitions for commonly used terms (like "synthetic phonics" or "linguistic phonics") but I could not think of any programs that conform to *all* D.McG's requirements for "linguistic phonics." It may be that hers is a counsel of perfection. The evidence is that *most* learners do not need to be explicitly taught every one of the most common 150-ish GPC's, though it is good to have information about how to do so for those children who do need such specificity.

The term "synthetic phonics" has a more definite meaning in the UK than in most of North America, where it is generally used as equivalent to "systematic phonics." The emphasis on teaching blending per se is not always present or understood.

Susan S.

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