Open AccessTeaching and the Phonics Debate: What Can We Learn?
Author(s) -
Brian Thompson
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
new zealand annual review of education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1178-3311
pISSN - 1171-3283
DOI - 10.26686/nzaroe.v0i11.1420
Subject(s) - phonics , reading (process) , status quo , meaning (existential) , mathematics education , whole language , psychology , pedagogy , teaching method , linguistics , primary education , political science , philosophy , law , psychotherapist
There is debate about whether New Zealand practices for teaching reading should include “more phonics”. With the focus on the first two years of school instruction, the status quo of receptive phonics and the teaching culture in which it is embedded are described and compared with the productive phonics practices of other teaching cultures. The response of New Zealand children to this practice is relatively faster reading procedures. However, there is much that remains to be learnt to sharpen New Zealand receptive phonics teaching practices to meet the successive developmental purposes of phonics; and also to reduce repetitive teaching rituals, as in practices to prompt for meaning.