English Spelling 'too Difficult' For Children

[winkie]

One teacher I had in primary school corrected spelling errors and we were made to repeat write the corrected word......another teacher never corrected spelling mistakes...therefore I believed them to be correct so continued throughout life spelling them incorrectly.

[snowflux]

If you 'you tube' C4 documentaries, you might find it on there, it was very interesting and eye opening, as I said, it was patchy and it was two years ago.

Our child, I think, can read and spell better than I could at his age. My school used sight for words not phonic spelling as recommended in this documentary.

I'm glad your son is being taught via the phonic method.

I'm not a big fan of C4 documentaries. The ones I've seen have tended to choose a position at the outset and then pull together any material that remotely supports that position while ignoring any material that counters their argument.

[JustYield]

Edit: By the way, his reading book for this week is called "The Salmon's Journey" and has also taught me things I didn't know. I never knew a fish could have so many names - first, alevin (how do you pronounce that?), then fry, parr and smolt before eventually becoming a salmon.

alevin

[snowflux]

alevin

Phew. That's pretty much what I guessed.

[JustYield]

NOTHING WRONG WITH CAPITAL LETTERS, or an extreme font!

Actually, capital letter words are read much slower by most people. We learn words by sight. We have the knowledge of the alphabet to fall back on for new words, but once we've loaded a word into our reading memory, we treat it as one block.

Well, thts m tk on t.

[JustYield]

Phew. That's pretty much what I guessed.

Sorted!

[Guest happy?]

What a strange conclusion to draw from the evidence. If the general rules of syntax and grammar have remained fairly constant, yet the levels of illiteracy are 'soaring' then surely there must be further factors involved. However it seems this woman has form and an update of the language is a hobby horse of hers. Nevertheless, surely one should be looking for the others facts involved in the 'soaring levels' in order to find an appropriate solution rather than one that meets one's own preconceptions.

Any linguists on the board with a view?

Cunning linguists?

[Guest happy?]

Well, if you won't view it, you'll have to take my word for it, it was done over several episodes if memory serves me correctly.

It was very good, it just wanted (it seemed to me), to show parents that phonics fonnix was a better way of teaching children to read and (eventually) spell and the evidence produced supported it, I'm pleased to have seen it as this is the way our child learned to read (as did yours) .

Edit: Grammar.

Corrected.

[Guest X-QUORK]

You know. :angry:

No I don't. You're being weird.

[swissy_fit]

Swissy has form on this, I disagreed with him on a subject and then he got all sarcastic.

Hey ho, there we go.

To be clear, of course you're entitled to your opinion, I merely found it ironic that your posts demanding that immigrants speak English on arrival were error-strewn.

[Woot]

Cunning linguists?

You are a very naughty man!

[swissy_fit]

What is the subject of the sentence that offended you? Clue: it is not you.

You want respect? I suggest you don't call me a ****** on a public forum. When was I rude to you?

All becomes clear, I think.

Here is the phrase that irritated me(I don't think it's the one you're referring to) :

"As you claim to be a reasonable linguist...."

If you assert something about yourself on the forum, I promise not to imply that you're lying. Then(I hope) you won't feel any urge to call me a w*nker.