Joined on 31/05/2007
Granzay, 2 Sèvres,79
Posts 8,188
Re: learning to read
At the end of maternelle my son could only write his name , ( never anything of what you mention , gardengirl, thank God!) but in CP, he could read at half term, indeed, as most kids in his class.
I speak in praise of l'école maternelle . It is intended to socialize children, develop their creativity, open to the world and society, they learn sometimes one has to wait to get something, they visit farms for example, they sometimes even go on a "trip", in my son's case, three days in a gite in the forest, where a guide helped them ientify trees, birds, he could even hold a snake in his hands...
It is the best part of school in France, the worst being collège ( 11/15 year olds) .
Life has a habit of biting you on the bum in ways that you least expect
I wonder if french is an easier language to learn to read than english? Does it have fewer irregularities, broken rules?
I worked as a teacher's aide with a Downs Syndrome child in a jewish nursery for a few years, and the 3yr olds had 5 minutes per day individual hebrew tuition. They could all read by 5. But hebrew is purely phonic.
In the UK there have been so many different schemes and theories as to how to improve literacy, all given up as a bad job. And spelling even more erratic. I think it's just a very difficult language to learn to read.
My own preferred method was early intro. to phonics followed by daily drill in word recognition.
21/10/2009, 6:19
