We've been watching entirely too much TV lately, with everybody being sick and all

[conuly]

Which is how we discovered Superwhy.

This show is seriously cute. SERIOUSLY.

So I visited their website. And if you click around a bit, you discover the part where the various characters have their own little videos. Princess Presto has "I love to spell". Great, great. She carefully sounds out the words, then spells them with her wand. Love it.

Except... she sounds out "Sing" by asking what letters make the N and G sounds.

Don't see the problem? Say the word a couple of times. A couple more. Slowly. Yeah. There's neither an N nor a G sound in it! Instead, there is a single ng sound - and that's the difference between sing and sin, so it's an important one! One would not spell out "Shin" as the S and H sounds, instead one would say that the sh sound is made from two letters, and that's the same principle here. BAD VIDEO. BAD.

(Meanwhile, Angelique is much more concerned about the fact that they don't say please to their supercomputer, and compelled me to type them a sternly worded email about it. We all have our priorities.)

Comments

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

I attended a talk with a national reading expert who discouraged sounding out words for most things, said it decreased fluency in the English language, that word recognition was better, for reasons similar to what you are saying now.

[conuly]

I... I don't exactly disagree, but I don't agree either.

1. I think that the goal should be to move past sounding out. If you continually have to sound out words, you're not really reading.
2. However, I think that the practice of sounding it out is a good way to teach reading... except that English does have some very odd short words that don't sound out easily.
3. Sing, however, isn't one of those words. Ng = one sound is fairly constant, and if people would present it that way (the same way they present th and sh) it wouldn't be a problem. It's only a problem when people insist it's two different sounds, and it's not.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

That's what I mean, past the initial word learning. Some kids sound out everything every time. She also doesn't like using pointer fingers, and feels kids should get used to reading in phrases, not word by word. And that when you spell a word for a kid, write it down, don't say it out loud, it improves their reading. Fluency is a big focus for this program.

It's an entire program but I can't find my notes. Since Fin doesn't sound things out I just buzzed by that part.

[conuly]

Gee... I don't ever spell things out for anybody. Even Ana now, unless it's one she couldn't possibly know, I make her work it out herself. "Well, let's see... aaaaaaahhhh. Do you know what letter makes an aaaaaahhh? Ahhhh-nuh. Hm." and so on.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

But in the case of one she couldn't possibly know, the suggestion is write it down and give them the word because seeing it reinforces it more than saying w-r-i-n-k-l-e or whatever.\



Also tthe program is CATCH A FALLING READER and the intended community is poor readers/at risk readers. Not every kid is as smart as Ana, or as advantaged. Finbar's school has a huge transient population rife with generational poverty and parental apathy. The fact that they turned this school around so quicky is fantastic, but yes, these programs are for kids who need a lot of help to catch up with peers with better resources than they have.

(Hell the fact they got 400 parents/guardians to show up at this talk was nothing short of a miracle.)

[conuly]

1. Fair enough :) I wonder how it would work, though, to spell it and make them write it as you spell it, giving a bit of muscle memory to that written image...?

2. That is a perfectly good point. I will add my caveat, though, that not every child learns the same way. Of course you know that, I'm just pointing out that even if this program works wonderfully for 90% of the population, there will be some who learn better some other way. When it comes to education, that sucks, since teachers can't teach 30 different ways to 30 different students (there's a lot of suckage in that, but that's beside the point), but in the real world, all thinking differently is probably a good, advantageous thing.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Well I would imagine after you write it, they have to copy it anyways. The program stresses tons of writing too.

And yeah, this school knows about not every kid learning the same way, I know because of the MASSIVE accommodations they make for Finbar. It blows my MIND how flexible they are. And it's not just for him, I volunteer there and see them work with others in different ways. Lots of staff, so lots of support.

Last year they learned math in a way so that different styles were accomodated, and the teacher would teach, say, six ways to add, and you would have to give her three examples. She'd say 'out of the six ways to solve this, show me a way/two ways' whatever and have kids show their way of doing it.

Also I saw their math books and they take a concept and work it different ways too. Math Trailblazers, I think. A lot of reinforcing different ways for one thing. Topped with accomodations for those who CANNOT learn another way (i.e. Finbar can't process visual things at a distance, he must use near point copying).

This state has a history of being good for education. It's not perfect but I'm pretty happy.

[conuly]

You should speak to ozarque, she's made at least two different posts that I can think of referring to inflexible teaching techniques, and she's just a wonderful person to read anyway, and she'd probably be thrilled to know some people teach in a sensible way.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

We had a teacher like that in the first grade here -- who came to the IEP meeting complaining that he would rather READ for a reward than watch TV in the class. She was so rattled by a kid like Fin that she wrote a bit of a personal statement about what she saw wrong and whimpered at the meeting "I just don't know what to DO with him!"

This teacher now found ways to give him breaks without him looking like FREAK KID WHO CANT HANDLE CLASS. I am thrilled. Two years running with great teachers. And that's gen ed -- I'm also happy that for Ted he has classes for autism spectrum kids and they do a lot of sensory stuff and accommodations. No adversives, no repetitive craziness, and a decent amount of general ed put in the mix with an aide.

K's school still pisses me off though. Abstinence only education? NO NO NO NO. Im still waiting for them to call me back so I can yell at them. (Well, wag a finger at them.)

[appadil.livejournal.com]

...I don't know if this is a dialectical difference or what, but as far as I'm concerned, there ARE very audibly two separate sounds. It's much more closely united than, say, the "st" of "first", but there's still a distinct "n" and "g" rather than the thoroughly fused sounds of "th" or "sh".

Do similar constructions like the "nd" in "mind" also scan as one phoneme to you?

[conuly]

Nd isn't one phoneme, it's two. Ng is, in my dialect and in everything I've heard, the specific phoneme ŋ, a velar nasal. My tongue doesn't hit the same place as it should to make an n, nor does it make a stop for the g. Unless I'm saying Long Island, then it comes out with a clear Lawn Guy Land sound, but for me it's definitely only that phrase.

[appadil.livejournal.com]

For me, my tongue hits the same spot for the "n" in "ng" as it does for any other "n" sound and starts sliding towards the spot it would normally go for "g", but never quite gets all the way there. It doesn't make a stop at any point, but neither does "nd"- it and "nd" are less distinct than consonant combinations like "ts" which have a clear phoneme separation, but it's vastly more distinct than "sh" or "th". It's sort of roughly on the same level as "pl"..

...Possibly related tangent, my sister pronounces terminal "ng"s oddly- to my family and I, she seems to be dropping the "g", but it's still possible to tell the difference between her "sin" and "sin(g)" even though I'd write it without the g if I were trying to transcribe her speech phonetically.
I'm wondering now if your "ŋ" might be the same as her "n(g)" which is virtually allophonic with "n" to me.

[conuly]

Well, now we've both learned something new, haven't we?

I'm never sure which smiley to insert to sound happy without any rudeness, so just pick your favorite and stick it in there.

[appadil.livejournal.com]

Heh. =^_^=

[feebeeglee.livejournal.com]

My son Gilbert loves Super Why! Here he is in his homemade Super Why! costume for Halloween: http://flickr.com/photos/feebeeglee/1816326421/

My kids play on that website as well - I noticed one 'off' example. It went something like "What letter says 'ks' 'ks' 'ks'? X! Xylophone!"

Made me chuckle.

[conuly]

I do wish people wouldn't use Xylophone or X-ray to demonstrate X in kid's books, and that example neatly sums up why.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

I attended a talk with a national reading expert who discouraged sounding out words for most things, said it decreased fluency in the English language, that word recognition was better, for reasons similar to what you are saying now.

[conuly]

I... I don't exactly disagree, but I don't agree either.

1. I think that the goal should be to move past sounding out. If you continually have to sound out words, you're not really reading.
2. However, I think that the practice of sounding it out is a good way to teach reading... except that English does have some very odd short words that don't sound out easily.
3. Sing, however, isn't one of those words. Ng = one sound is fairly constant, and if people would present it that way (the same way they present th and sh) it wouldn't be a problem. It's only a problem when people insist it's two different sounds, and it's not.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

That's what I mean, past the initial word learning. Some kids sound out everything every time. She also doesn't like using pointer fingers, and feels kids should get used to reading in phrases, not word by word. And that when you spell a word for a kid, write it down, don't say it out loud, it improves their reading. Fluency is a big focus for this program.

It's an entire program but I can't find my notes. Since Fin doesn't sound things out I just buzzed by that part.

[conuly]

Gee... I don't ever spell things out for anybody. Even Ana now, unless it's one she couldn't possibly know, I make her work it out herself. "Well, let's see... aaaaaaahhhh. Do you know what letter makes an aaaaaahhh? Ahhhh-nuh. Hm." and so on.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

But in the case of one she couldn't possibly know, the suggestion is write it down and give them the word because seeing it reinforces it more than saying w-r-i-n-k-l-e or whatever.\



Also tthe program is CATCH A FALLING READER and the intended community is poor readers/at risk readers. Not every kid is as smart as Ana, or as advantaged. Finbar's school has a huge transient population rife with generational poverty and parental apathy. The fact that they turned this school around so quicky is fantastic, but yes, these programs are for kids who need a lot of help to catch up with peers with better resources than they have.

(Hell the fact they got 400 parents/guardians to show up at this talk was nothing short of a miracle.)

[conuly]

1. Fair enough :) I wonder how it would work, though, to spell it and make them write it as you spell it, giving a bit of muscle memory to that written image...?

2. That is a perfectly good point. I will add my caveat, though, that not every child learns the same way. Of course you know that, I'm just pointing out that even if this program works wonderfully for 90% of the population, there will be some who learn better some other way. When it comes to education, that sucks, since teachers can't teach 30 different ways to 30 different students (there's a lot of suckage in that, but that's beside the point), but in the real world, all thinking differently is probably a good, advantageous thing.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Well I would imagine after you write it, they have to copy it anyways. The program stresses tons of writing too.

And yeah, this school knows about not every kid learning the same way, I know because of the MASSIVE accommodations they make for Finbar. It blows my MIND how flexible they are. And it's not just for him, I volunteer there and see them work with others in different ways. Lots of staff, so lots of support.

Last year they learned math in a way so that different styles were accomodated, and the teacher would teach, say, six ways to add, and you would have to give her three examples. She'd say 'out of the six ways to solve this, show me a way/two ways' whatever and have kids show their way of doing it.

Also I saw their math books and they take a concept and work it different ways too. Math Trailblazers, I think. A lot of reinforcing different ways for one thing. Topped with accomodations for those who CANNOT learn another way (i.e. Finbar can't process visual things at a distance, he must use near point copying).

This state has a history of being good for education. It's not perfect but I'm pretty happy.

[conuly]

You should speak to ozarque, she's made at least two different posts that I can think of referring to inflexible teaching techniques, and she's just a wonderful person to read anyway, and she'd probably be thrilled to know some people teach in a sensible way.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

We had a teacher like that in the first grade here -- who came to the IEP meeting complaining that he would rather READ for a reward than watch TV in the class. She was so rattled by a kid like Fin that she wrote a bit of a personal statement about what she saw wrong and whimpered at the meeting "I just don't know what to DO with him!"

This teacher now found ways to give him breaks without him looking like FREAK KID WHO CANT HANDLE CLASS. I am thrilled. Two years running with great teachers. And that's gen ed -- I'm also happy that for Ted he has classes for autism spectrum kids and they do a lot of sensory stuff and accommodations. No adversives, no repetitive craziness, and a decent amount of general ed put in the mix with an aide.

K's school still pisses me off though. Abstinence only education? NO NO NO NO. Im still waiting for them to call me back so I can yell at them. (Well, wag a finger at them.)

[appadil.livejournal.com]

...I don't know if this is a dialectical difference or what, but as far as I'm concerned, there ARE very audibly two separate sounds. It's much more closely united than, say, the "st" of "first", but there's still a distinct "n" and "g" rather than the thoroughly fused sounds of "th" or "sh".

Do similar constructions like the "nd" in "mind" also scan as one phoneme to you?

[conuly]

Nd isn't one phoneme, it's two. Ng is, in my dialect and in everything I've heard, the specific phoneme ŋ, a velar nasal. My tongue doesn't hit the same place as it should to make an n, nor does it make a stop for the g. Unless I'm saying Long Island, then it comes out with a clear Lawn Guy Land sound, but for me it's definitely only that phrase.

[appadil.livejournal.com]

For me, my tongue hits the same spot for the "n" in "ng" as it does for any other "n" sound and starts sliding towards the spot it would normally go for "g", but never quite gets all the way there. It doesn't make a stop at any point, but neither does "nd"- it and "nd" are less distinct than consonant combinations like "ts" which have a clear phoneme separation, but it's vastly more distinct than "sh" or "th". It's sort of roughly on the same level as "pl"..

...Possibly related tangent, my sister pronounces terminal "ng"s oddly- to my family and I, she seems to be dropping the "g", but it's still possible to tell the difference between her "sin" and "sin(g)" even though I'd write it without the g if I were trying to transcribe her speech phonetically.
I'm wondering now if your "ŋ" might be the same as her "n(g)" which is virtually allophonic with "n" to me.

[conuly]

Well, now we've both learned something new, haven't we?

I'm never sure which smiley to insert to sound happy without any rudeness, so just pick your favorite and stick it in there.

[appadil.livejournal.com]

Heh. =^_^=

[feebeeglee.livejournal.com]

My son Gilbert loves Super Why! Here he is in his homemade Super Why! costume for Halloween: http://flickr.com/photos/feebeeglee/1816326421/

My kids play on that website as well - I noticed one 'off' example. It went something like "What letter says 'ks' 'ks' 'ks'? X! Xylophone!"

Made me chuckle.

[conuly]

I do wish people wouldn't use Xylophone or X-ray to demonstrate X in kid's books, and that example neatly sums up why.