Our kids have been blessed with excellent teachers this year. Joel's two teachers are particularly good. They've put a lot of thought into how to teach him (much thought is needed!) and his report card includes many insightful comments.
His English comment amused us.
'Joel's oral reading is quite fluent and he has a good understanding of what he reads. He uses some good strategies such as re-reading, self-correcting and he makes meaningful substitutions if he does not know a word. The only strategy lacking is using phonics* to decode unknown words.'
*phonics = sounding out words
Sorry Simone. I'm missing as to why this is funny.
ReplyDeleteSorry, I meant "amusing".
ReplyDeleteFor most kids, phonics is the #1 way they learn to read and then attempt to read unknown words. Joel has managed to learn to read without phonics. He simply cannot sound out words with more than a few (3 or 4) letters in them. And yet he has learnt to read ... by his own round-a-bout, complicated method. This is Joel all over. Last year we were tearing our hair out. This year we smile.
ReplyDeleteActually, it's about 50/50. Phonics works for the other 50% though (normally)! Both should be taught.
ReplyDeleteHe's going to need phonics as he gets older, obviously.